Praise for Thanks for the Feedback

“Receiving feedback is a skill, and like most skills, it requires practice and a

willingness to change and improve. . . . [Thanks For The Feedback is] the

best guide I’ve found to learning this skill.”

—Jessica Lahey, The New York Times

“Thanks for the Feedback is an extraordinarily useful book. It’s full of

helpful techniques that can be put to use by anyone seeking to manage an

organization, lead a team, engage a business partner, or navigate a

relationship. . . . Stone and Heen have done a remarkable job of showing

individuals and organizations how to leverage the enormous value of

feedback, one of the most powerful instruments available for human

learning.”

—Strategy + Business

“Thanks for the Feedback takes a 180-degree turn in the usual approach to

feedback. Instead of teaching readers to deliver it effectively, Stone and

Heen show them how to receive it in a way that builds self-awareness and

action planning for improvement. . . . Stone and Heen describe in a

meaningful way what is entirely true about the feedback process: It’s a

complex interchange that is inevitably influenced by the perceptions and

biases of the giver and receiver. An excellent follow up to their bestselling

book Difficult Conversations, Thanks for the Feedback provides a powerful

framework for making feedback work—no matter what it is or how it is

given.”

—T+D Magazine

“This unique book addresses how to accept feedback gracefully, whether

your boss is giving you a review, your kids are commenting on their

meatloaf dinner, or your mother-in-law is offering snide commentary on

your parenting style . . . [Stone and Heen] hit it out of the park with well-

researched insight, advice, and tips.”

—Parents Magazine

“We all need to get better at hearing feedback. That doesn’t entail always

accepting it, [but] it does mean abandoning the knee-jerk response of railing

against feedback you consider unfair and instead trying to figure out why

the difference of viewpoint has arisen. . . . The book asks a question worth

memorizing: what’s the one thing you see me doing that gets in my own

way?”

—The Guardian (London)

“The book isn’t a manifesto for being a pushover: Thanks for the Feedback

instructs in the art of understanding feedback and turning criticism into a

kick-ass attitude. Saints needn’t apply.”

—Evening Standard

“Feedback is everywhere. We may not be able to exert complete control

over what someone else thinks of us but we can certainly do something

about what we choose to do with the feedback. [This] is a sensible, breezily

written book.”

—Financial Times

“Surprisingly little attention has been focused on being an effective

recipient of feedback. Enter Stone and Heen with a well-rounded

consideration of ‘the science and art of receiving feedback well.’ As they

write, both of those disciplines are required to receive feedback in

productive ways—not only in the workplace, but in personal life as

well. . . . The authors do an excellent job of constraining the applications to

feedback usefulness while also exploring some of the other ways we can

define what ‘feedback’ consists of in our lives. With a culture increasingly

focused on the individual and the self, this book on developing the ability to

accept and utilize the input of others constructively deserves a wide

readership.”

—Kirkus Reviews

“I’ll admit it: Thanks for the Feedback made me uncomfortable. And that’s

one reason I liked it so much. With keen insight and lots of practical

takeaways, Stone and Heen reveal why getting feedback is so hard—and

then how we can do better. If you relish receiving criticism at work and

adore it in your personal life, then you may be the one person on earth who

can safely skip this book.”

—Daniel H. Pink, author of To Sell Is Human and Drive

“Thanks for the Feedback is a potentially life-changing look at one of the

toughest but most important parts of life: receiving feedback. It’s a road

map to less defensiveness, more self-awareness, greater learning, and richer

relationships. Doug Stone and Sheila Heen have delivered another tour de

force.”

—Adam Grant, Wharton professor and author of Give and Take

“Imagine an organization where everyone is actually good at receiving

feedback. Collective anxiety would be reduced. People would learn and

grow. Impossible you say? Thanks to this insanely original and powerful

book, maybe not.”

—Judy Rosenblum, former chief learning officer of Coca-Cola and

founder of Duke Corporate Education

“Startlingly original advice for how to make feedback truly useful.”

—Chris Benko, vice president of global talent management of Merck

“If you want to lead a learning organization, improving the quality of feed‐

back is job one. This book is an essential guide to making that happen.”

—Amy C. Edmondson, Novartis Professor of Leadership and Management,

Harvard Business School, and author of Teaming

“Learning and HR professionals aren’t the only ones who will love this

book. It should be required reading for anyone receiving a performance

appraisal—and anyone who is striving to improve.”

—B. Alan Echtenkamp, executive director of global organization

and leadership development, Time Warner Inc.

“Accepting feedback at work is important, but in families, it’s vital. This

simple, elegant book teaches us how.”

—Bruce Feiler, New York Times columnist and author

of The Secrets of Happy Families

“Thanks for the Feedback places the reader in the driver’s seat and shifts

the paradigm on who is in charge of the learning.”

—Wagner Denuzzo, director, IBM Management Development

“My management team and I are reading Thanks for the Feedback. We

spend hours discussing it, as if it were directions to a lifetime gift of free

donuts and coffee! We now have a way to set meaningful standards for

productive feedback and most importantly, for developing sensible

solutions with officers who are struggling. Melding your concepts with our

desires of service and professionalism within our California state police

agency are a perfect match. We are integrating the material into a training

we hope to offer the entire department.”

—J. Edwards, Jr., Lieutenant Commander and police academy instructor

“Thanks for the Feedback is not about how to give feedback. It’s a far more

powerful book than that. It’s about how to receive feedback. . . . We should

love feedback, positive or negative. But we’re also proud . . . that’s why this

book is so good. We have an image of ourselves as someone who can cope

emotionally with criticism and is open minded. Yet the reality is that we’re

human beings, and very different to each other. The book recognizes that

we each react differently. It provides us with ways to cope, handle, and

grow with feedback.”

—Dan Cottrell, International Rugby Coaching magazine

PENGUIN BOOKS

THANKS FOR THE FEEBACK

Douglas Stone and Sheila Heen are Lecturers on Law at Harvard Law

School and cofounders of Triad Consulting. Their clients include the White

House, Citigroup, Honda, Johnson & Johnson, Time Warner, Unilever, and

many others. Stone Lives in Cambridge. Heen lives with her husband and

three children in a farmhouse north of Cambridge.

ALSO BY DOUGLAS STONE & SHEILA HEEN

Difficult Conversations (with Bruce Patton)

PENGUIN BOOKS

An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

375 Hudson Street

New York, New York 10014

penguin.com

First published in the United States of America by Viking Penguin, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 2014

Published in Penguin Books 2015

Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant

culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing,

scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to

continue to publish books for every reader.

the Norman Rockwell Family Entitites.

Graphs by Julie Munn

THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS HAS CATALOGED THE HARDCOVER EDITION AS FOLLOWS:

Stone, Douglas.

Thanks for the feedback : the science and art of receiving feedback well (even when it is off base, unfair, poorly delivered, and,

frankly, you’re not in the mood) / Douglas Stone, Sheila Heen.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-101-61427-3

1. Feedback (Psychology). 2. Interpersonal communication. I. Heen, Sheila. II. Title.

BF319.5.F4S76 2014

153.6’8—dc23

2013036968

While the author has made every effort to provide accurate telephone numbers, Internet addresses, and other contact information

at the time of publication, neither the publisher nor the author assumes any responsibility for errors or for changes that occur after

publication. Further, the publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party

Web sites or their content.

Version_1

To Anne and Don Stone,

the best parents in the world.

You taught me what matters.

—ds

To John, Benjamin, Peter, and Adelaide,

for accepting me despite my flaws,

and even (occasionally) because of them.

—sh

CONTENTS
PRAISE FOR THANKS FOR THE FEEDBACK
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
ALSO BY DOUGLAS STONE & SHEILA HEEN
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
DEDICATION
INTRODUCTION
From Push to Pull
THE FEEDBACK CHALLENGE
1. THREE TRIGGERS
That Block Feedback
TRUTH TRIGGERS
2. SEPARATE APPRECIATION, COACHING, AND EVALUATION
3. FIRST UNDERSTAND
Shift from “That’s Wrong” to “Tell Me More”
4. SEE YOUR BLIND SPOTS
Discover How You Come Across
RELATIONSHIP TRIGGERS
5. DON’T SWITCHTRACK
Disentangle What from Who
6. IDENTIFY THE RELATIONSHIP SYSTEM
Take Three Steps Back

IDENTITY TRIGGERS
7. LEARN HOW WIRING AND TEMPERAMENT AFFECT YOUR STORY
8. DISMANTLE DISTORTIONS
See Feedback at “Actual Size”
9. CULTIVATE A GROWTH IDENTITY
Sort Toward Coaching
FEEDBACK IN CONVERSATION
10. HOW GOOD DO I HAVE TO BE?
Draw Boundaries When Enough Is Enough
11. NAVIGATE THE CONVERSATION
KEYFRAMES OF THE CONVERSATION
THE ARC OF THE CONVERSATION: OPEN-BODY-CLOSE
OPEN BY GETTING ALIGNED
BODY: FOUR SKILLS FOR MANAGING THE CONVERSATION
CLOSE WITH COMMITMENT
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER: A CONVERSATION IN MOTION
12. GET GOING
Five Ways to Take Action
NAME ONE THING
TRY SMALL EXPERIMENTS
RIDE OUT THE J CURVE
COACH YOUR COACH
INVITE THEM IN
13. PULL TOGETHER
Feedback in Organizations
 
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
NOTES ON SOME RELEVANT ORGANIZATIONS
NOTES
ROAD MAP

INTRODUCTION

From Push to Pull

Before you tell me how to do it better, before you lay out your big

plans for changing, fixing, and improving me, before you teach me

how to pick myself up and dust myself off so that I can be shiny and

successful—know this: I’ve heard it before.

I’ve been graded, rated, and ranked. Coached, screened, and

scored. I’ve been picked first, picked last, and not picked at all. And

that was just kindergarten.

We swim in an ocean of feedback.

Each year in the United States alone, every schoolchild will be handed

back as many as 300 assignments, papers, and tests. Millions of kids will be

assessed as they try out for a team or audition to be cast in a school play.

Almost 2 million teenagers will receive SAT scores and face college

verdicts thick and thin. At least 40 million people will be sizing up one

another for love online, where 71 percent of them believe they can judge

love at first sight. And now that we know each other . . . 250,000 weddings

will be called off, and 877,000 spouses will file for divorce.1

More feedback awaits at work. Twelve million people will lose a job and

countless others will worry that they may be next. More than 500,000

entrepreneurs will open their doors for the first time, and almost 600,000

will shut theirs for the last. Thousands of other businesses will struggle to

get by as debates proliferate in the boardroom and the back hall about why

they are struggling. Feedback flies.2

Did we mention performance reviews? Estimates suggest that between

50 and 90 percent of employees will receive performance reviews this year,

upon which our raises, bonuses, promotions—and often our self-esteem—

ride. Across the globe, 825 million work hours—a cumulative 94,000 years

—are spent each year preparing for and engaging in annual reviews.

Afterward we all certainly feel thousands of years older, but are we any

wiser?3

Margie receives a “Meets Expectations,” which sounds to her like

“Really, You Still Work Here?”

Your second grader’s art project, “Mommy Yells,” was a hot topic at

the school’s Open House Night.

Your spouse has been complaining about your same character flaws

for years. You think of this less as your spouse “giving you feedback,”

and more as your spouse “being annoying.”

Rodrigo reads over his 360-degree feedback report.4 Repeatedly. He

can’t make head or tail of it, but one thing has changed: He now feels

awkward with his colleagues, all 360 degrees of them.

Thanks for the Feedback is about the profound challenge of being on the

receiving end of feedback—good or bad, right or wrong, flippant, caring, or

callous. This book is not a paean to improvement or a pep talk on how to

make friends with your mistakes. There is encouragement here, but our

primary purpose is to take an honest look at why receiving feedback is hard,

and to provide a framework and some tools that can help you metabolize

challenging, even crazy-making information and use it to fuel insight and

growth.

• • •

In 1999, along with our friend and colleague Bruce Patton, we published

Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most. Since then,

we’ve continued to teach at Harvard Law School and to work with clients

across continents, cultures, and industries. We’ve had the privilege of

working with an amazing assortment of people: executives, entrepreneurs,

oil rig operators, doctors, nurses, teachers, scientists, engineers, religious

leaders, police officers, filmmakers, lawyers, journalists, and relief workers.

Even dance instructors and astronauts.

Here’s something we noticed early on: When we ask people to list their

most difficult conversations, feedback always comes up. It doesn’t matter

who they are, where they are, what they do, or why they brought us in.

They describe just how tough it is to give honest feedback, even when they

know it’s sorely needed. They tell us about performance problems that go

unaddressed for years and explain that when they finally give the feedback,

it rarely goes well. The coworker is upset and defensive, and ends up less

motivated, not more. Given how hard it is to muster the courage and energy

to give feedback in the first place, and the dispiriting results—well, who

needs it?

Eventually, someone in the group will pipe up to observe that getting

feedback is often no easier. The feedback is unfair or off base. It’s poorly

timed and even more poorly delivered. And it’s not clear why the giver

thinks they are qualified to offer an opinion; they may be the boss, but they

don’t really understand what we do or the constraints we’re under. We are

left feeling underappreciated, demotivated, and more than a little indignant.

Who needs it?

Interesting. When we give feedback, we notice that the receiver isn’t

good at receiving it. When we receive feedback, we notice that the giver

isn’t good at giving it.

We wondered: What is it that makes feedback such a conundrum for both

givers and receivers? We started listening closely to people as they

described their dilemmas, struggles, and triumphs, and noticed those same

struggles in ourselves. As we worked to develop ways to approach feedback

differently, we soon realized that the key player is not the giver, but the

receiver. And we came to see how this could transform not just how we

handle performance reviews on the job, but how we learn, lead, and behave

in our professional roles and in our personal lives.

WHAT COUNTS AS FEEDBACK?

Feedback includes any information you get about yourself. In the broadest

sense, it’s how we learn about ourselves from our experiences and from

other people—how we learn from life. It’s your annual performance review,

the firm’s climate survey, the local critic’s review of your restaurant. But

feedback also includes the way your son’s eyes light up when he spots you

in the audience and the way your friend surreptitiously slips off the sweater

you knitted her the minute she thinks you’re out of view. It’s the steady

renewal of services by a longtime client and the lecture you get from the

cop on the side of the road. It’s what your bum knee is trying to tell you

about your diminishing spryness, and the confusing mix of affection and

disdain you get from your fifteen-year-old.

So feedback is not just what gets ranked; it’s what gets thanked,

commented on, and invited back or dropped. Feedback can be formal or

informal, direct or implicit; it can be blunt or baroque, totally obvious or so

subtle that you’re not sure what it is.

Like that comment your spouse made a moment ago: “I don’t like the

way those pants look on you.” What do you mean, you don’t like the way

these pants look on me? Is there something wrong with this particular pair

of pants, or was that a passive-aggressive reference to the weight I’ve put

on? Another dig about how I’m living in the past or can’t dress myself,

even as an adult? Are you trying to help me look nice for the party, or is this

your way of easing into asking for a divorce? (What do you mean I’m

overreacting?)

A BRIEF HISTORY OF FEEDBACK

The term “feed-back” was coined in the 1860s during the Industrial

Revolution to describe the way that outputs of energy, momentum, or

signals are returned to their point of origin in a mechanical system.5 By

1909 Nobel laureate Karl Braun was using the phrase to describe the

coupling and loops between components of an electronic circuit. A decade

later the new compound word “feedback” was being used to describe the

recirculating sound loop in an amplification system—that piercing squeal

we all know from high school auditoriums and Jimi Hendrix recordings.

Sometime after World War II the term began to be used in industrial

relations when talking about people and performance management. Feed

corrective information back to the point of origin—that would be you, the

employee—and voilà! Tighten up here, dial back there, and like some Dr.

Seuss contraption, you’re all tuned up for optimum, star-bellied

performance.

In today’s workplace, feedback plays a crucial role in developing talent,

improving morale, aligning teams, solving problems, and boosting the

bottom line. And yet. Fifty-one percent of respondents in one recent study

said their performance review was unfair or inaccurate, and one in four

employees dreads their performance review more than anything else in their

working lives.6

The news is no more encouraging on the manager’s side: Only 28

percent of HR professionals believe their managers focus on more than

simply completing forms. Sixty-three percent of executives surveyed say

that their biggest challenge to effective performance management is that

their managers lack the courage and ability to have difficult feedback

discussions.7

Something isn’t working. So organizations are spending billions of

dollars each year to train supervisors, managers, and leaders on how to give

feedback more effectively. When feedback meets resistance or is rejected

outright, feedback givers are encouraged to be persistent. They are taught

how to push harder.

We think we have it backwards.

PULL BEATS PUSH

Training managers how to give feedback—how to push more effectively—

can be helpful. But if the receiver isn’t willing or able to absorb the

feedback, then there’s only so far persistence or even skillful delivery can

go. It doesn’t matter how much authority or power a feedback giver has; the

receivers are in control of what they do and don’t let in, how they make

sense of what they’re hearing, and whether they choose to change.

Pushing harder rarely opens the door to genuine learning. The focus

should not be on teaching feedback givers to give. The focus—at work and

at home—should be on feedback receivers, helping us all to become more

skillful learners.

The real leverage is creating pull.

Creating pull is about mastering the skills required to drive our own

learning; it’s about how to recognize and manage our resistance, how to

engage in feedback conversations with confidence and curiosity, and even

when the feedback seems wrong, how to find insight that might help us

grow. It’s also about how to stand up for who we are and how we see the

world, and ask for what we need. It’s about how to learn from feedback—

yes, even when it is off base, unfair, poorly delivered, and frankly, you’re

not in the mood.

We like the word “pull” because it highlights a truth often ignored: that

the key variable in your growth is not your teacher or your supervisor. It’s

you. It’s well and good to hope for that special mentor or coach (and cherish

the ones you come across). But don’t put off learning until they arrive.

Those exceptional teachers and mentors are rare. Mostly, our lives are

populated by everyone else—people who are doing their best but may not

know better, who are too busy to give us the time we need, who are difficult

themselves, or who are just plain lousy at giving feedback or coaching. The

majority of our learning is going to have to come from folks like these, so if

we’re serious about growth and improvement, we have no choice but to get

good at learning from just about anyone.

THE TENSION BETWEEN LEARNING AND BEING ACCEPTED

It seems like that shouldn’t be so hard. After all, humans are naturally wired

for learning. The drive to learn is evident from infancy and rampant by

toddlerhood. Even as adults we memorize baseball stats, travel in

retirement, and throw ourselves into yoga because discovery and progress

are deeply gratifying. Indeed, research on happiness identifies ongoing

learning and growth as a core ingredient of satisfaction in life.

We may be wired to learn, but it turns out that learning about ourselves is

a whole different ball game. Learning about ourselves can be painful—

sometimes brutally so—and the feedback is often delivered with a

forehead-slapping lack of awareness for what makes people tick. It can feel

less like a “gift of learning” and more like a colonoscopy.

Tom’s boss gives him a dressing-down about his “organizational

skills.” On his drive home, Tom silently catalogues his boss’s

inadequacies. He pulls over and jots down a list to keep them

organized.

Monisha, the head of HR, hoped the grim results from the firm’s

climate survey would spark candid conversation among senior

leadership about the need for change. Instead, she got a terse e-mail

from the CFO enumerating the survey’s methodological flaws,

dismissing the results, and questioning Monisha’s motives.

Kendra’s sister-in-law lets slip that the family thinks she is hysterically

overprotective of her children. Perhaps not precisely those words, but

that’s the tape running in Kendra’s mind as she sets the table for the

extended family Sunday dinner.

It’s no wonder that when we see tough feedback coming, we are tempted

to turn and run.

But we know we can’t just tra-la-la down the road of life ignoring what

others have to say, safely sealed in our emotional Ziploc. We’ve heard it

since we were young. Feedback is good for you—like exercise and broccoli.

It makes you stronger and helps you grow. Doesn’t it?

It does. And our life experiences confirm it. We’ve all had a coach or

family member who nurtured our talent and believed in us when no one else

did. We’ve had a friend who laid bare a hard truth that helped us over an

impossible hurdle. We’ve seen our confidence and capabilities grow, our

relationships righted, and our rough edges softened. In fact, looking back,

we have to admit that even that horrendous ex-spouse or overbearing

supervisor taught us as much about ourselves as those who were on our

side. It wasn’t easy, but we know ourselves better now, and like ourselves

more.

So here we are. Torn. Is it possible that feedback is like a gift and like a

colonoscopy? Should we hang in there and take it, or turn and run? Is the

learning really worth the pain?

We are conflicted.

Here’s one reason why. In addition to our desire to learn and improve, we

long for something else that is fundamental: to be loved, accepted, and

respected just as we are. And the very fact of feedback suggests that how

we are is not quite okay. So we bristle: Why can’t you accept me for who I

am and how I am? Why are there always more adjustments, more upgrades?

Why is it so hard for you to understand me? Hey boss, hey team. Hey wife,

hey Dad. Here I am. This is me.

Receiving feedback sits at the intersection of these two needs—our drive

to learn and our longing for acceptance. These needs run deep, and the

tension between them is not going away. But there’s a lot each of us can do

to manage the tension—to reduce anxiety in the face of feedback and to

learn in spite of the fear. We believe that the ability to receive feedback well

is not an inborn trait but a skill that can be cultivated. It may be fraught, but

it can be taught. Whether you currently think of yourself as someone who

receives feedback well or poorly, you can get better. This book shows you

how.

THE BENEFITS OF RECEIVING WELL

Receiving feedback well doesn’t mean you always have to take the

feedback. Receiving it well means engaging in the conversation skillfully

and making thoughtful choices about whether and how to use the

information and what you’re learning. It’s about managing your emotional

triggers so that you can take in what the other person is telling you, and

being open to seeing yourself in new ways. And sometimes, as we discuss

in chapter 10, it’s about setting boundaries and saying no.

The bold-faced benefits of receiving feedback well are clear: Our

relationships are richer, our self-esteem more secure, and, of course, we

learn—we get better at things and feel good about that. And perhaps most

important to some of us, when we get good at receiving feedback even our

toughest feedback interactions come to feel a little less threatening.

In the workplace, treating feedback not just as something to be endured,

but something to be actively sought, can have a profound impact. Feedback-

seeking behavior—as it’s called in the research literature—has been linked

to higher job satisfaction, greater creativity on the job, faster adaptation in a

new organization or role, and lower turnover. And seeking out negative

feedback is associated with higher performance ratings.8

Perhaps this isn’t surprising. People who are willing to look at

themselves are just easier to work with and to live with. Being with people

who are grounded and open is energizing. When you’re open to feedback

your working relationships have more trust and more humor, you

collaborate more productively and solve problems more easily.

In personal relationships, our ability to deal with complaints, requests,

and coaching from our friends and loved ones is crucial. Even in the best

relationships we get frustrated with each other; we hurt each other

accidentally and—on occasion—on purpose. Our ability to sort out how

we’re feeling, why we’re upset, where we are bumping into one another,

drives the long-term health and happiness of those relationships. Marriage

researcher John Gottman has found that a person’s willingness and ability to

accept influence and input from their spouse is a key predictor of a healthy,

stable marriage.9

In contrast, working or living with someone who shuts out feedback or

responds with defensiveness and arguments is exhausting. We walk on

eggshells and live in fear of pointless conflicts. Frank discussion fades and

feedback goes unspoken, depriving the “receiver” of the chance to

understand what’s gone wrong or to fix it. The transaction costs involved in

the simplest problem solving become prohibitive, and important thoughts

and feelings have no outlet. Problems fester and the relationship stagnates.

Insulation leads to isolation.

That’s not just depressing, it’s destructive, particularly today. Columnist

Thomas Friedman observes, “We’re entering a world that increasingly

rewards individual aspiration and persistence and can measure precisely

who is contributing and who is not. If you are self-motivated, wow, this

world is tailored for you. The boundaries are all gone. But if you’re not

self-motivated, this world will be a challenge because the walls, ceilings

and floors that protected people are also disappearing.”10

The rewards are great, and the stakes have never been higher.

This suggests that it’s not just about us; it’s also about our kids. Whether

or not we realize it, how we talk about an unfair performance evaluation in

front of our children teaches them how to react to a bad call that costs them

the ball game. Our kids respond to tough challenges the way they see us

respond to tough challenges. Will a bully’s name-calling eat away at their

self-image? They will look to how we respond to our own setbacks; that

teaches them more about resilience than all our pep talks and lectures

combined.

The transformative impact of modeling is crucial at work as well. If you

seek out coaching, your direct reports will seek out coaching. If you take

responsibility for your mistakes, your peers will be encouraged to fess up as

well; if you try out a suggestion from a coworker, they will be more open to

trying out your suggestions. And this modeling effect becomes more

important as you move up in an organization. Nothing affects the learning

culture of an organization more than the skill with which its executive team

receives feedback. And of course, as you move up, candid coaching

becomes increasingly scarce, so you have to work harder to get it. But

doing so sets the tone and creates an organizational culture of learning,

problem solving, and adaptive high performance.

DIGGING FOR PONIES

There is an old joke about a happy young optimist whose parents are trying

to teach him to see the world more realistically. To that end, they decide to

give him a large sack of horse dung for his birthday.

“What did you get?” asks his grandmother, wrinkling her nose at the

smell.

“I don’t know,” cries the boy with delight as he excitedly digs through

the dung. “But I think there’s a pony in here somewhere!”

Receiving feedback can be like that. It’s not always pleasant. But there

just might be a pony in there somewhere.

THE FEEDBACK CHALLENGE

THREE TRIGGERS

That Block Feedback

Let’s start with some good news. Not all feedback is difficult. Your son’s

teacher, astonishingly, praises his social skills. Your customer offers a

clever suggestion about how to handle his order that expedites the process.

You want bangs, but your hairdresser has a better idea, which is, actually, a

better idea. We get this sort of feedback all the time. It helps or it doesn’t,

and either way we’re not much bothered by it.

Most of us do just fine with positive feedback, although even praise can

sometimes leave us uneasy. Perhaps we’re not sure it’s genuine or we fear

we haven’t earned it. But closing the deal, or learning that someone you

admire admires you, or getting that perfect bit of coaching that kicks your

skill level up a notch can be electrifying. We did it, it worked, someone

likes us.

Then there’s the tougher stuff—the feedback that leaves us confused or

enraged, flustered or flattened. You’re attacking my child, my career, my

character? You’re going to leave me off the team? Is that really what you

think of me?

This kind of feedback triggers us: Our heart pounds, our stomach

clenches, our thoughts race and scatter. We usually think of that surge of

emotion as being “in the way”—a distraction to be brushed aside, an

obstacle to overcome. After all, when we’re in the grip of a triggered

reaction we feel lousy, the world looks darker, and our usual

communication skills slip just out of reach. We can’t think, we can’t learn,

and so we defend, attack, or withdraw in defeat.

But pushing our triggered reactions aside or pretending they don’t exist

is not the answer. Trying to ignore a triggered reaction without first

identifying its cause is like dealing with a fire by disconnecting the smoke

alarm.

So triggers are obstacles, but they aren’t only obstacles. Triggers are also

information—a kind of map—that can help us locate the source of the

trouble. Understanding our triggers and sorting out what set them off are the

keys to managing our reactions and engaging in feedback conversations

with skill.

Let’s take a closer look at that map.

THREE FEEDBACK TRIGGERS

Because feedback givers are abundant and our shortcomings seemingly

boundless, we imagine that feedback can trigger us in a googolplex of

ways. But here’s more good news:

There are only three.

We call them “Truth Triggers,” “Relationship Triggers,” and “Identity

Triggers.” Each is set off for different reasons, and each provokes a

different set of reactions and responses from us.

Truth Triggers are set off by the substance of the feedback itself—it’s

somehow off, unhelpful, or simply untrue. In response, we feel indignant,

wronged, and exasperated. Miriam experiences a truth trigger when her

husband tells her she was “unfriendly and aloof” at his nephew’s bar

mitzvah. “Unfriendly? Was I supposed to get up on the table and tap

dance?” This feedback is ridiculous. It is just plain wrong.

Relationship Triggers are tripped by the particular person who is giving

us this gift of feedback. All feedback is colored by the relationship between

giver and receiver, and we can have reactions based on what we believe

about the giver (they’ve got no credibility on this topic!) or how we feel

treated by the giver (after all I’ve done for you, I get this kind of petty

criticism?). Our focus shifts from the feedback itself to the audacity of the

person delivering it (are they malicious or just stupid?).

By contrast, Identity Triggers focus neither on the feedback nor on the

person offering it. Identity triggers are all about us. Whether the feedback is

right or wrong, wise or witless, something about it has caused our identity

—our sense of who we are—to come undone. We feel overwhelmed,

threatened, ashamed, or off balance. We’re suddenly unsure what to think

about ourselves, and question what we stand for. When we’re in this state,

the past can look damning and the future bleak. That’s the identity trigger

talking, and once it gets tripped, a nuanced discussion of our strengths and

weaknesses is not in the cards. We’re just trying to survive.

Is there anything wrong with any of the reactions above? If the feedback

is genuinely off target or the person giving it has proven untrustworthy, or

we feel threatened and off balance, aren’t these responses pretty reasonable?

They are.

Our triggered reactions are not obstacles because they are unreasonable.

Our triggers are obstacles because they keep us from engaging skillfully in

the conversation. Receiving feedback well is a process of sorting and

filtering—of learning how the other person sees things; of trying on ideas

that at first seem a poor fit; of experimenting. And of shelving or discarding

the parts of the feedback that in the end seem off or not what you need right

now.

And it’s not just the receiver who learns. During an effective

conversation, the feedback giver may come to see why their advice is

unhelpful or their assessment unfair, and both parties may understand their

relationship in a clarifying light. They each see how they are reacting to the

other, showing a way forward that’s more productive than what either

imagined before.

But it’s nearly impossible to do any of this from inside our triggers. And

so we make mistakes that cause us to put potentially valuable feedback into

the discard pile, or just as damaging, we take to heart feedback that is better

left at the curb.

WHY WE GET TRIGGERED AND WHAT HELPS

Let’s look more closely at each of the three triggers and get an overview of

what we can do to manage them more effectively.

1. TRUTH TRIGGERS: THE FEEDBACK IS WRONG, UNFAIR, UNHELPFUL

There are lots of good reasons not to take feedback, and at the front of the

line stands this one: it’s wrong. The advice is bad, the evaluation is unjust,

the perception someone has of us is outdated or incomplete. We reject,

defend, or counterattack, sometimes in the conversation but always in our

minds.

But understanding the feedback we get well enough to evaluate it fairly

turns out to be much harder than it appears. Below are three reasons why

and what helps.

Separate Appreciation, Coaching, and Evaluation

The first challenge in understanding feedback is that, surprisingly often, we

don’t know whether it is feedback, and if it is, we’re not sure exactly what

kind it is or how on earth it’s supposed to help us. Yes, we did ask for

feedback; no, we did not ask for whatever it is that they’ve just offered us.

Part of the problem is that the word “feedback” can mean a number of

different things. A pat on the back is feedback, and so is a dressing-down.

Helpful pointers are feedback, and so is getting voted off the island. These

aren’t just positive and negative; they’re fundamentally different kinds of

feedback, with entirely different purposes.

The very first task in assessing feedback is figuring out what kind of

feedback we are dealing with. Broadly, feedback comes in three forms:

appreciation (thanks), coaching (here’s a better way to do it), and evaluation

(here’s where you stand). Often the receiver wants or hears one kind of

feedback, while the giver actually means another. You finally show your

professional artist friend the self-portrait you painted. At this stage of your

development, what you need is a little encouragement, something along the

lines of “Hey, cool. Keep working at it.” What you get instead is a list of

twelve things you need to fix.

We can flip this story. You showed your work to your professional artist

friend because you were hoping for a list of twelve things to fix, and instead

get a “Hey, cool. Keep working at it.” How is that going to help you get

better?

Know what you want, and know what you’re getting. The match matters.

First Understand

Sounds obvious, seems easy: Before you figure out what to do with the

feedback, make sure you understand it. Like us, you probably think you’re

doing this already. You listen to the feedback. You accept it or you reject it.

But in the context of receiving feedback, “understanding” what the other

person means—what they see, what they’re worried about, what they’re

recommending—is not so easy. In fact, it’s flat-out hard.

Consider Kip and Nancy. They work for an organization that recruits

talent for sought-after jobs overseas. Nancy tells Kip that he seems biased

against candidates with nontraditional backgrounds. Nancy says that his

bias is “seeping through” during interviews.

At first, Kip dismisses this feedback. His bias does not “seep through”

because he does not have a bias. In fact, although Nancy is unaware of it,

Kip himself has a nontraditional background, and if anything, he worries

that he tends to favor candidates who’ve had the initiative to chart their own

course in life.

So as far as Kip can tell, this feedback is simply wrong. Are we

suggesting that he should accept it as right, nonetheless? No. We’re saying

that Kip doesn’t yet know what the feedback actually means. The first step

is for him to work harder to understand exactly what Nancy sees that is

causing concern.

Kip eventually asks Nancy to clarify her feedback, and she explains:

“When you interview traditional candidates, you describe common

challenges the job presents, and observe how they reason through it. With

nontraditional candidates, you don’t discuss the job. You just shoot the

breeze about the candidate’s coffee cart business or travels with the

merchant marine. You’re not taking them seriously.”

Kip is starting to understand and offers Nancy his view in response: “In

my mind, I’m taking them very seriously. I’m listening for their persistence

and resourcefulness—critical skills for demanding overseas jobs with

unclear boundaries and harsh conditions. That’s better than presenting some

hypothetical challenge.”

Following the guideline to first understand, Kip is getting a sense of

where Nancy is coming from and Nancy is getting a sense of Kip’s

perspective. A good start, but as we’ll see below, there’s still a ways to go.

See Your Blind Spots

Complicating our desire to understand feedback is the matter of blind spots.

Of course, you don’t have blind spots, but you know that your colleagues,

family, and friends certainly do. That’s the nature of blind spots. We’re not

only blind to certain things about ourselves; we’re also blind to the fact that

we’re blind. Yet, gallingly, our blind spots are glaringly obvious to

everybody else.

This is a key cause for confusion in feedback conversations. Sometimes

feedback that we know is wrong really is wrong. And sometimes, it’s just

feedback in our blind spot.

Let’s come back to Kip and Nancy. Nancy sees something important that

Kip can’t: Kip. She watches and hears Kip when he is conducting

interviews. She’s noticed that Kip is more animated when he interviews

nontraditional candidates; he talks louder and interrupts more often, giving

them less space—and sometimes almost no space—to make their case.

Kip is so surprised by this observation that he can barely believe it’s true.

He simply was not aware he was doing that. And he’s dismayed: If what

Nancy is saying is right, then despite his good intentions, he might actually

be disadvantaging the candidates that he is most excited to talk to. His

slight bias in favor of these nontraditional candidates is actually working

against them.

So Kip and Nancy have each learned something from their conversation.

Nancy understands Kip’s intentions in a more generous light, and Kip is

starting to get a handle on how his behavior is actually affecting the

interviews. The conversation isn’t over, but they are in a better place to

straighten things out.

Managing truth triggers is not about pretending there’s something to

learn, or saying you think it’s right if you think it’s wrong. It’s about

recognizing that it’s always more complicated than it appears and working

hard to first understand. And even if you decide that 90 percent of the

feedback is off target, that last golden 10 percent might be just the insight

you need to grow.

2. RELATIONSHIP TRIGGERS: I CAN’T HEAR THIS FEEDBACK FROM YOU

Our perception of feedback is inevitably influenced (and sometimes tainted)

by who is giving it to us. We can be triggered by something about the giver

—their (lack of) credibility, (un)trustworthiness, or (questionable) motives.

We can likewise be triggered by how we feel treated by that person. Do

they appreciate us? Are they delivering the feedback in a respectful manner

(by e-mail? Are you kidding?). Are they blaming us when the real problem

is them? Our twenty years of simmering history together can intensify our

reaction, but interestingly, relationship triggers can get tripped even when

we have only twenty seconds of relationship history at this red light.

Don’t Switchtrack: Disentangle What from Who

Relationship triggers produce hurt, suspicion, and sometimes anger. The

way out is to disentangle the feedback from the relationship issues it

triggers, and to discuss both, clearly and separately.

In practice, we almost never do this. Instead, as receivers, we take up the

relationship issues and let the original feedback drop. From the point of

view of the person giving us the feedback, we have completely changed the

topic—from their feedback to us (“be on time”) to our feedback to them

(“don’t talk to me that way”). The topic of “who” defeats the topic of

“what” and the original feedback is blocked. We call this dynamic

Switchtracking.

Let’s come back to Miriam at the bar mitzvah. In addition to

experiencing a truth trigger, Miriam also endures a relationship trigger.

When her husband, Sam, accuses her of being aloof, she feels

unappreciated and hurt, and so she switchtracks: “Do you have any idea

what I went through just to get to that bar mitzvah? I rearranged Mom’s

dialysis and got Matilda bathed and dressed so she’d look presentable at the

party for your nephew, the one whose name you can’t even remember.”

Miriam raises important concerns about appreciation and division of

chores, but she is effectively changing the topic from Sam’s feedback about

her unfriendliness to her feelings about Sam’s lack of appreciation. If Sam

is genuinely troubled that Miriam is not treating his family as warmly as

he’d like, that’s an important conversation to have—as is the conversation

about Miriam’s feeling underappreciated. But they are two different topics,

and should be two different conversations.

Trying to talk about both topics simultaneously is like mixing your apple

pie and your lasagna into one pan and throwing it in the oven. No matter

how long you bake it, it’s going to come out a mess.

Identify the Relationship System

The first kind of relationship trigger comes from our reaction to the other

person: I don’t like how I am being treated, or I don’t trust your judgment.

We can have these reactions even when the feedback itself has nothing to

do with the relationship. You might be teaching me how to hit a tennis ball

or balance a checkbook.

But often, feedback is not only happening in the context of a

relationship; it’s created by the relationship itself. Embedded in the hurly-

burly of every relationship is a unique pairing of sensitivities, preferences,

and personalities. It is the nature of our particular pairing—rather than

either of us individually—that creates friction. The giver is telling us that

we need to change, and in response we think: “You think the problem is

me? That’s hilarious, because the problem is very obviously you.” The

problem is not that I am oversensitive; it’s that you are insensitive.

Another example: You set aggressive revenue targets to motivate me. But

they don’t motivate me; they discourage me. When I come up short, your

fix is to set even higher targets to “light a fire under me.” Now I feel more

hopeless. We each point our finger at the other, but neither of us is putting

our finger on the problem. Neither of us sees that we are both caught in a

reinforcing loop of this two-person system and that we are each doing

things that perpetuate it.

So feedback in relationships is rarely the story of you or me. It’s more

often the story of you and me. It’s the story of our relationship system.

When they blame you, and it feels unfair, blaming them back is not the

answer. To them, that will seem unfair, and worse, they’ll assume you’re

making excuses. Instead, work to understand it this way: “What’s the

dynamic between us and what are we each contributing to the problem?”

3. IDENTITY TRIGGERS: THE FEEDBACK IS THREATENING AND I’M OFF BALANCE

Identity is the story we tell ourselves about who we are and what the future

holds for us, and when critical feedback is incoming, that story is under

attack. Our security alarm sounds, the brain’s defense mechanisms kick in,

and before the giver gets out their second sentence we’re gearing up to

counterattack or pass out. Our response can range from a minor adrenaline

jolt to profound destabilization.

Learn How Wiring and Temperament Affect Your Story

Not everyone shuts down in the same way, in response to the same things,

or for the same amount of time. This is the first challenge of understanding

identity triggers: At a purely biological level, we’re all wired differently and

we each respond in our own way to stressful information, just as we each

respond in our own way to roller-coaster rides. Raissa can’t wait to get on

the roller coaster for a second and third time; Elaine feels that that one ride

may have ruined the entire rest of her life. Understanding the common

wiring patterns as well as your own temperament gives you insight into

why you react as you do, and helps explain why others don’t react the way

you expect them to.

Dismantle Distortions

Consider Laila. Whether due to wiring, life experience, or both, she is

highly sensitive to feedback. Whatever the feedback is, she distorts and

magnifies it. She’s not responding to the words of the giver; she’s

responding to her distorted perception of those words.

When her boss comments that she’ll need to be “on her game” at

tomorrow’s meeting, she wonders whose game her boss thinks she’s been

on up to now. Does he think I don’t know what I’m doing? Does he think I

don’t understand the importance of the meeting? She recalls other

interactions she’s had with him and starts to question whether he’s ever had

any confidence in her and, given what a screwup she is, whether he even

should. Fifteen years of past mistakes come flooding to the fore. She

doesn’t sleep that night, and is a mess during the meeting.

Luckily for Laila (and the rest of us), it is possible to learn to keep

feedback in perspective, even when doing so doesn’t come naturally. Laila

needs to become aware of the ways she typically distorts feedback and the

patterns her mind follows. Once aware, she can begin systematically to

dismantle those distortions. That in turn helps her to regain her balance and

allows her to engage with and learn from the feedback.

Cultivate a Growth Identity

In addition to her tendency to distort the feedback, Laila has a mindset

challenge: She sees the world as one big test. Every day at work is a test,

every meeting is a test, every interaction with a boss or friend is a test. And

every instance of feedback is a test result, a verdict. So even when someone

offers her coaching or encouragement—“be on your game tomorrow!”—

she hears it as a damning assessment that she’s not.

Research conducted at Stanford points to two very different ways people

tell their identity story and the effect that can have on how we experience

criticism, challenge, and failure. One identity story assumes our traits are

“fixed”: Whether we are capable or bumbling, lovable or difficult, smart or

dull, we aren’t going to change. Hard work and practice won’t help; we are

as we are. Feedback reveals “how we are,” so there’s a lot at stake.

Those who handle feedback more fruitfully have an identity story with a

different assumption at its core. These folks see themselves as ever

evolving, ever growing. They have what is called a “growth” identity. How

they are now is simply how they are now. It’s a pencil sketch of a moment

in time, not a portrait in oil and gilded frame. Hard work matters; challenge

and even failure are the best ways to learn and improve. Inside a growth

identity, feedback is valuable information about where one stands now and

what to work on next. It is welcome input rather than upsetting verdict.

• • •

In chapters 2 through 9, we take a closer look at each of our triggers, the

way they trip us up, and key strategies for handling them more

productively. In chapters 10 and 11 we turn to the question of when it’s

okay to turn down feedback and how to handle the feedback conversation

itself. In chapter 12 we offer a handful of powerful ideas for testing out

feedback and getting quick traction on growth.

Finally, in chapter 13, we look at feedback in groups, and present ideas

for creating pull in organizations. When it comes to our teams, our families,

our firms, and our communities, we really are in it together. We can

generate pull within our organizations and our teams by inspiring

individuals to drive their own learning and seek out surprises and

opportunities for growth. And we can help each other to stay balanced

along the way.

While names have been changed, the stories are based on the experiences

of real people. We hope you recognize yourself at times, feel reassured

always, and come to see that you are not alone in the struggle.

TRUTH TRIGGERS

and the challenge to

SEE

Truth Triggers (and the challenge to SEE)

In the next three chapters we look at truth triggers. Truth triggers are created by our

cognitive and emotional reaction to feedback when it seems wrong or off target. When we

are triggered, it's hard to see—to see what type of feedback we're getting (chapter 2), to

see what the giver means (chapter 3), and to see ourselves clearly (chapter 4).

Chapter 2 distinguishes among three types of feedback and helps you see why it matters

which kind of feedback you want and which kind of feedback you are getting. It always

comes down to purpose.

In chapter 3, we show you how to interpret feedback—where it’s coming from, what it’s

suggesting you do differently, and why you and the giver might disagree. We examine why

understanding feedback is so hard in the first place, and give you the tools you need to get

it right.

In chapter 4 we look at blind spots, and make the case that you have them even if you’re

pretty sure you don’t. We show you the impact they have, and why it’s such a challenge to

see yourself as others do. And we’ll offer some ideas for how to beat your blind spots and

learn despite them.

As you approach these chapters, have this question marinating in the back of your mind:

Why is it that when we give feedback we so often feel right, yet when we receive feedback it

so often feels wrong? After finishing chapter 4, you’ll have the answer.

SEPARATE APPRECIATION, COACHING,

AND EVALUATION

It’s a beautiful spring Saturday.

Dad takes his twin daughters, Annie and Elsie, to the park to work on

their batting. He shows them how to adjust their stance, maintain a level

swing, and keep their eye on the ball.

Annie finds the experience exhilarating. She’s spending time with her

dad on the freshly cut grass, and can feel herself improve with each crack of

the bat. Elsie, meanwhile, is glum. She slumps against the fence, and when

Dad tries to cajole her into the batter’s box to offer tips on timing, she

scowls: “You think I’m uncoordinated! You always criticize me!”

“I’m not criticizing,” Dad corrects. “Honey, I’m trying to help you

improve.”

“See!” Elsie wails. “You think I’m not good enough!” The bat clatters to

the dirt as she stomps off the field.

ONE DAD, TWO REACTIONS

Dad is puzzled. From his point of view, he’s treating both twins the same,

yet their responses to his feedback could not be more different. One

receives his coaching as intended, using the tips to sharpen her skills and

build her confidence. The other retreats in frustration, refusing to try, angry

with him for even offering an opinion.

Dad is, in fact, treating the girls the same. He’s offering the same advice

in the same tone of voice. If we were watching the action from the

bleachers, we’d see no difference.

But at the plate, the difference is clear. Each girl is hearing something

different in Dad’s words. To Annie, Dad’s advice is like a softball thrown

down the middle of the plate; to Elsie, it’s like being hit by a pitch.

This is one of the paradoxical aspects of getting feedback. Sometimes we

feel like Annie—grateful, eager, energized. At other times we react like

Elsie—hurt, defensive, resentful. Our responses don’t always hinge on the

skill of the giver or even on what is being said. Rather, they’re based on

how we are hearing what’s said and which kind of feedback we think we

are getting.

THERE ARE THREE KINDS OF FEEDBACK

The company you work for was recently acquired, your role changed, and

your team reshuffled. It’s a chaotic and uncertain time, and you and a

colleague from the old company meet up regularly after hours at the bar

across the street to compare notes on the transition.

One evening you mention to your friend that you’re not getting any

feedback from your new boss, Rick. Your friend is surprised: “Just

yesterday Rick was telling everyone at the meeting how grateful he is to

have you on the team. I’d call that feedback. What do you want, a trophy?”

Sure, Rick appreciates you, which is nice. But you have something else

in mind: “Here’s the problem. I used to be the head of marketing for the

greater Miami area. Now I’m head of product campaigns for the Pacific

Rim. I don’t even know what the Pacific Rim is.” A trophy would be nice,

but what you really need is some coaching.

A few weeks later your friend asks how it’s going. Generally well, you

explain: “I told Rick that I needed more direction. So we meet each week to

go over what I’m doing and questions I have. He’s got a lot of insight into

the region.” Your friend is envious: “So Rick appreciates you. Rick coaches

you. Sounds like you’re pretty set on the feedback front.”

But you’re not. There’s one other thing. Since the merger, you’re unsure

where you stand. Titles and roles now overlap, and there’s always talk of

cutbacks. “I can’t tell whether I’m just filling a hole until Rick can find

someone with better background for this,” you admit to your friend. “I’m

learning as fast as I can, but I don’t know if I’m part of his long-term vision

or just a stopgap.”

Your friend suggests you raise the issue directly with Rick, and you do.

Rick tells you that he’s done a careful evaluation of your work and thinks

it’s extremely strong. And then he lets on that he’s grooming you to be his

successor when he moves on to a new role at the parent company.

That evening you share the good news with your friend, and he

congratulates you heartily. And then adds: “As long as we’re on the topic of

feedback, how come you never ask for feedback from me?” You counter:

“Because you don’t have feedback for me.” After an awkward silence, you

say, “Okay, what?” And with surprising aggressiveness, your friend says

this: “When’s the last time you picked up the check? When’s the last time

you talked about anyone but yourself?” Holy cow.

Your friend calls this feedback, but you’re pretty sure it’s called picking a

fight.

These conversations between you and Rick, and you and your friend,

highlight that when we use the word “feedback,” we may be referring to

any of three different kinds of information: appreciation, coaching, and

evaluation. Each serves an important purpose, each satisfies different needs,

and each comes with its own set of challenges.1

APPRECIATION

When your boss says how grateful he is to have you on the team, that’s

appreciation.

Appreciation is fundamentally about relationship and human connection.

At a literal level it says, “thanks.” But appreciation also conveys, “I see

you,” “I know how hard you’ve been working,” and “You matter to me.”

Being seen, feeling understood by others, matters deeply. As children

these needs are right on the surface as we call across the playground, “Hey,

Mom! Mom! Mom! Watch this!” If, as adults, we learn not to pester quite

so obviously, we never outgrow the need to hear someone say, “Wow, look

at you!” And we never outgrow the need for those flashes of

acknowledgment that say, “Yes, I see you. I ‘get’ you. You matter.”

Appreciation motivates us—it gives us a bounce in our step and the

energy to redouble our efforts. When people complain that they don’t get

enough feedback at work, they often mean that they wonder whether

anyone notices or cares how hard they’re working. They don’t want advice.

They want appreciation.

COACHING

When you ask your boss for more direction, you’re asking for coaching.

Coaching is aimed at trying to help someone learn, grow, or change. The

focus is on helping the person improve, whether it involves a skill, an idea,

knowledge, a particular practice, or that person’s appearance or personality.

In the realm of executive coaching, "coaching" is sometimes used as a term

of art to describe a facilitative approach to learning, where the coachee sets

the agenda. We include this, but use the word more generally to include

mentoring or any other feedback that is intended to help someone grow.

Your ski instructor, the guy at the Apple Genius Bar, the veteran waiter

assigned to show you the ropes on your first day, and that empathetic friend

who advises you on your mixed-up personal life are all coaches in this

sense. So are bosses, clients, grandparents, peers, siblings, even our direct

reports and children. And of course, we all have “accidental” coaches. That

knucklehead in the Land Rover behind you has a point that you should get

off your cell phone and stay in your lane.

Coaching can be sparked by two different kinds of needs. One is the need

to improve your knowledge or skills in order to build capability and meet

novel challenges. In your new role you’re working to learn about the

markets, products, channels, culture—and location—of the Pacific Rim.

In the second kind of coaching feedback, the feedback giver is not

responding to your need to develop certain skills. Instead, they are

identifying a problem in your relationship: Something is missing,

something is wrong. This type of coaching is often prompted by emotion:

hurt, fear, anxiety, confusion, loneliness, betrayal, or anger. The giver wants

this situation to change, and (often) that means they want you to change:

“You don’t make our family a priority,” “Why am I always the one who has

to apologize?” or “When’s the last time you picked up the check?” The

“problem” the coaching is aimed at fixing is how the giver is feeling, or a

perceived imbalance in the relationship.

EVALUATION

When your boss says your performance is “extremely strong” and that he’s

grooming you for his job, that’s evaluation (in this case, positive).

Evaluation tells you where you stand. It’s an assessment, ranking, or rating.

Your middle school report card, your time in the 5k, the blue ribbon

awarded your cherry pie, the acceptance of your marriage proposal—these

are all evaluations. Your performance review—“outperforms” or “meets

expectations” or “needs improvement”—is an evaluation. And so is that

nickname your team has for you when you’re not around.

Evaluations are always in some respect comparisons, implicitly or

explicitly, against others or against a particular set of standards. “You are

not a good husband” is shorthand for “You are not a good husband

compared with what I hoped for in a husband” or “compared with my

saintly father” or “compared with my last three husbands.”

Evaluations align expectations, clarify consequences, and inform

decision making. Your rating has implications for your bonus, your time in

the backstroke means you did or didn’t qualify. Part of what can be hard

about evaluation is concern about possible consequences—real or imagined.

You didn’t qualify (real), and never will (predicted or imagined).

And sometimes, evaluations contain judgments that go beyond the

assessment itself: Not only didn’t you qualify in the backstroke, but you

were naïve to think you would, and so, once again, you’ve fallen short of

your potential. The judgment that you are naïve or falling short is not based

on the assessment—the outcome of the race. It’s an additional layer of

opinion on top of it. And it is the bullwhip of negative judgment—from

ourselves or others—that produces much of our anxiety around feedback.

Surprisingly, reassurance—“You can do this” and “I believe in you”—

also falls into the category of additional judgments, but on the positive side.

PLAYING TO THE GALLERY

Six years of classical violin lessons instilled in Luke solid technical skills, but no love of the

violin. Then someone handed him a ukulele, and he was hooked. He quickly made a name for

himself locally, and when America’s Got Talent came to town, he auditioned successfully for

the show.

The seventeen-year-old performed in front of a hometown audience of five thousand. The

spotlight obscured the audience but not the three neon red X’s that glowed at his feet. Sharon

Osbourne shook her head, and Howard Stern said theatrically, “My mother made me play the

clarinet. Your mother should never have let you play the ukulele.” The audience roared with

laughter.

Stunned, Luke turned wordlessly and stumbled offstage, where he was accosted by a

camera crew: “How do you feel? What do you make of the judges’ feedback?”

Good question.

In the days and weeks that followed, amid red-X nightmares, one thing finally became

clear to Luke: The primary purpose of the show is not a thoughtful evaluation of each

contestant’s talent, for the contestant’s sake. The main purpose is to entertain the TV

audience. This was feedback to him only in the loosest sense. It was evaluation, certainly,

almost a parody of evaluation: The judges told him where he stood vis-à-vis a future on the

show, and certainly they conveyed their contempt for the ukulele as an instrument.

It’s easy to see the distinction between entertainment and real feedback when it involves

someone else. But when it’s about us, it’s harder.

These days it’s more important than ever to learn how to make that distinction. The arenas

for vitriolic “feedback” are proliferating: online comments, message boards, blogs, talk radio,

reality TV. Harsh commentary, malicious attacks, and anonymous venting in these forums are

common, catering to reader cheers or jeers. The commenters are focused on saying something

they think is clever or biting or attention-getting, and they may not even be aware of the real

people behind the post they are using as a punching bag.

Luke is still performing. “It wasn’t easy to get back on stage, in part because I had to step

onto the same stage three weeks later,” he says. He had previously won the region’s teen

talent competition with his playful juxtaposition of Bach, Sinatra, and rock and roll and he

was invited to do a showcase performance as the winner.

Now Luke says he wouldn’t trade his America’s Got Talent experience for the world. “I

learned a huge amount about myself. Nothing scares me now,” Luke laughs. “The worst thing

that could happen? It already did, and I survived.”

WE NEED ALL THREE

Each form of feedback—appreciation, coaching, and evaluation—satisfies a

different set of human needs. We need evaluation to know where we stand,

to set expectations, to feel reassured or secure. We need coaching to

accelerate learning, to focus our time and energy where it really matters,

and to keep our relationships healthy and functioning. And we need

appreciation if all the sweat and tears we put into our jobs and our

relationships are going to feel worthwhile.

Type of

Feedback

Giver’s Purpose

Appreciation To see, acknowledge, connect, motivate, thank

Coaching To help receiver expand knowledge, sharpen skill, improve capability

Or, to address the giver’s feelings or an imbalance in the relationship

Evaluation To rate or rank against a set of standards, to align expectations, to inform

decision making

EVALUATION SHORTFALLS

Because evaluation is so loud and can have such hurtful consequences, it’s

tempting to consider removing it from the feedback mix. Do we really need

it?

It is smart to avoid evaluation when your purpose is coaching. Don’t say,

“You’re no good,” when what you really mean to say is “Here’s how to get

better.”

But doing away with evaluation altogether leaves a conspicuous silence.

Should I put my name in for the new position, or am I wasting my time?

Where is this relationship going? Are we moving in because we’ll soon be

engaged, or because you want to save some money while you wait for

someone better?

We are anxious about being assessed and judged, but at the same time,

we need an “evaluative floor” on which to stand, reassuring us that we are

good enough so far. Before I can take in coaching or appreciation, I need to

know that I’m where I need to be, that this relationship is going to last.

When evaluation is absent, we use coaching and appreciation to try to

figure out where we stand. Why does the boss give me so much coaching

on handling the customer more effectively? And why was I singled out for

appreciation in that first group e-mail, but not the second? Should I be

concerned? In the absence of clear signals, I’ll keep putting my ear to the

ground to listen for rumblings in anything that passes by.

APPRECIATION SHORTFALLS

Appreciation can seem the least important of the three kinds of feedback—

who needs flowery words or flattery? Aren’t you getting a paycheck? We’re

still married, aren’t we?

Yet the absence of appreciation can leave a gaping hole in any

relationship—personal or professional. Sure, I want to know how to

improve, but I also want to know that you see how hard I’m working, how

much I’m trying, what I do that’s special. Without that, your coaching isn’t

going to get through, because I’m listening for something else.

In First Break All the Rules, authors Marcus Buckingham and Curt

Coffman describe a landmark Gallup survey of eighty thousand workers.

The survey found that “Yes” answers on twelve key questions—dubbed the

Q12—had strong correlations with employee satisfaction, high retention,

and high productivity. Of the twelve questions, three are directly related to

appreciation:

Question 4: “In the last seven days, have I received recognition or praise

for doing good work?”

Question 5: “Does my supervisor, or someone at work, seem to care

about me as a person?”

Question 6: “Is there someone at work who encourages my

development?”2

When workers answer “No” to these questions, it’s not necessarily

because supervisors don’t care or aren’t saying “Thanks.” But they’re not

doing so in a way that matters.

Three qualities are required for appreciation to count. First, it has to be

specific. This is tricky; most of us offer both appreciation and positive

evaluation in grand strokes like “Good work!” or “You were fabulous!” or

“Thanks for everything!”

In contrast to the vagueness of our appreciation, our negative feedback—

or “areas for improvement”—often consists of a list of 118 detailed items.

We focus on the negative because we are focused on an immediate problem:

Yes, you did a good job overall, but our task at this moment is to address

the latest supply chain snafu or the product placement. When we’re under

pressure to get things done, our feelings of anxiety, frustration, and anger

about what’s wrong trump any feelings of appreciation, even if, upon

reflection, we really are appreciative.

Over time, appreciation deficits set in. And these often become two-way:

I think you don’t appreciate all I do and all I put up with, and you think I

don’t appreciate whatever-it-is you do. Call it Mutual Appreciation Deficit

Disorder (MADD), and you have the ingredients for a troubled working

relationship.

Second, appreciation has to come in a form the receiver values and hears

clearly. Gary Chapman makes a similar point about love in his book The 5

Love Languages. Some of us take in love through words (“I love you”),

while others hear it more clearly through acts of service, quality time,

physical contact, or gifts. If I feel unloved, it could be because you don’t

love me—or it could be because you’re expressing it in a way that I don’t

take in.3

The same is true for appreciation. For some, a monthly paycheck is all

the “attaboy” they need. For others, public recognition is meaningful,

whether in the form of team e-mail, kudos at a meeting, or organizational

awards. For some it’s promotion and titles—even if they earn the same or

less pay. And for many of us, it’s the feeling we get from knowing we’re a

trusted adviser or indispensable player. I know you appreciate me because

we laugh a lot, or because you come to me first with tough challenges.

Third, meaningful appreciation has to be authentic. If employees start to

sense that everyone receives appreciation for the smallest accomplishments

—“thanks for coming to work today”—appreciation inflation sets in, and

the currency becomes worthless. Nor can appreciation be issued through

gritted teeth: “I can’t believe I inherited such a screwup, but I need to check

this appreciation box, so, uh, good work!” Nobody’s fooled, and now they

trust you even less.

COACHING SHORTFALLS

Some coaching relationships require extraordinary effort while others feel

almost magically uncomplicated. But in either case, when coaching works,

it can be deeply gratifying and impactful for both people.

Of course, coaching can also be stressful, confusing, and ineffective. In

some organizations, coaching is not formally rewarded—or “counted”—and

is thus rarely given. Even when encouraged, mentors need only a few

experiences where their efforts to help only make things worse, suck up

time, or are met with arguments or ingratitude before they decide it’s not

worth the trouble.

Even well-intended coaches and coachees can become frustrated. We’re

trying to coach or to be coached, but because our efforts are resisted,

unappreciated, or ineffective, we end up with a coaching shortfall.

Coaching shortfalls mean that learning, productivity, morale, and

relationships all suffer. And that’s particularly tragic when people on both

sides of the relationship are well meaning and trying hard.

BEWARE CROSS-TRANSACTIONS

One of the key challenges of feedback conversations is that wires often get

crossed. There are two ways this happens. First, I might want a different

type of feedback from the type you gave me—for example, I was looking

for appreciation, but you gave me evaluation. Second, you may have

intended to give me one kind of feedback, but I interpreted it incorrectly—

for example, you sought to give me coaching, but I heard it as evaluation.

Once crossed, these wires are tough to untangle.

Consider the feedback confusion at the law offices where April, Cody,

and Evelyn work. They all report to a partner named Donald, who has never

been particularly good at giving feedback. Encouraged by Human

Resources and the annual campaign around performance, they each make

an appointment to talk to Donald about getting more feedback.

Donald’s assistant, April, goes first. Donald is actually pleased that April

took the initiative to ask for feedback. He gives April a number of concrete

suggestions for how she could manage her time better, including getting her

workspace better organized and being more assertive about saying no. April

says thanks, leaves Donald’s office, and wonders what the heck just

happened.

April just wanted a bit of appreciation. She has been working for Donald

for eight years and has become good at anticipating his needs. Others say

she works tirelessly, but she often feels stressed and overwhelmed. Donald

never comments on a job well done, never says thanks. In fact, he hardly

seems to notice her at all. April is in serious need of a pat on the back and a

great big “I see all that you do for me.”

What she got instead was coaching—ideas on how she could improve.

The conversation hit her hard, leaving her feeling more invisible than

ever. She wonders if she should quit. The problem wasn’t that Donald’s

feedback was wrong or poorly delivered. His coaching was thoughtful and

actually quite useful. April’s distress results from the cross-transaction: She

wanted one thing and got another.

First-year lawyer Cody fared no better. He submitted a research memo to

Donald last Thursday and was hoping to get specific suggestions for how to

approach such assignments more efficiently in the future. He often feels

adrift and knows the research takes him more time than it should. He wants

coaching. Donald reads the memo carefully, smiles and reassures Cody:

“Based on this memo and the other work you’ve done, I’d say you’re right

on track for a first-year lawyer.” Cody gets evaluation. And like April, he’s

dismayed: “How is that going to help me figure out what I’m doing?” He

faces his next assignment feeling more lost than ever.

Evelyn is a senior associate wondering where she stands in the march

toward partnership. As she begins to describe what she’s looking for,

Donald jumps in: “Evelyn, I know I’m not good with a compliment, but I

can tell you that it means a lot to me when I see you staying late and here

on weekends. I notice that. I’m sorry if I haven’t always said so over the

years.”

Evelyn gets appreciation—the great big thanks that April craved. But, of

course, what Evelyn wanted was evaluation. She wants to know where she

ranks in relation to her peers as partnership looms. Evelyn appreciates the

appreciation, but she is now more anxious than ever. Her billable hours

have always been high, but the last two associates with high billable hours

failed to make partner because they weren’t bringing in new business.

Evelyn wonders whether Donald’s thank-you was code for “thank you and

goodbye”—an indirect way of saying things aren’t going to work out.

Evelyn is left reading the tea leaves of appreciation for any traces of the

evaluation she seeks.

Donald and his colleagues are 0 for 3 on good feedback conversations.

Put another way, they’re 3 for 3 on cross-transactions. In this farcical

round-robin, April wants appreciation but gets coaching, Cody wants

coaching but gets evaluation, and Evelyn wants evaluation but gets

appreciation. All the while Donald is so pleased with his newfound

feedback-giving abilities that he wonders whether he might be just the guy

to lead an in-house training for other partners on how to give feedback well.

A COMPLICATION: THERE IS ALWAYS EVALUATION IN COACHING

Back out on the ball field, Dad is doing his best to be clear with his twin

daughters. In his mind, his intention is straightforward: He’s coaching.

That’s how Annie hears it, but as we know, Elsie hears it as evaluation:

“You think I’m uncoordinated!” and “You think I’m not good enough!”

Elsie worries that in Dad’s eyes, she is not stacking up.

So, even though Dad is being thoughtful about his purposes, there’s still

a cross-transaction. Why does Elsie hear the coaching as evaluation? Any

number of reasons. Maybe she feels implicit comparisons to her sister, feels

insecure about her athletic prowess, or believes her dad isn’t always fair.

Perhaps she’s been looking forward to time with Dad all week, but had

something other than baseball in mind. Or it could just be that she didn’t

sleep well or didn’t eat breakfast.

In addition to whatever else is going on between Elsie and her dad,

there’s a structural component to their miscommunication as well: there’s

some amount of evaluation in all coaching. The coaching message “here’s

how to improve” also implicitly conveys the evaluative message that “so far

you aren’t doing it as well as you might.”

Dad is doing his best to avoid evaluation. He’s not saying, “I’m

appraising each of you. Annie, you’re coordinated. Elsie, you are not.” That

would be explicit evaluation (not to mention a strange thing for a father to

say). And yet, because there’s evaluation in all coaching, he can’t avoid it

completely. To Annie, it’s irrelevant; she’s hearing the coaching and

dismissing the evaluative piece. To Elsie, the evaluation is the loudest part

of the message and drowns out everything else.

Elsie’s reaction to her dad’s feedback reminds us that the giver has only

partial control over how the balance between coaching and evaluation is

received. I may intend my comment about keeping two hands on the

steering wheel as commonsense coaching, but you may hear it as

evaluation: You’re irresponsible.

On the receiving end, we constantly funnel the advice we’re given into

either evaluation or coaching slots. How you hear your girlfriend’s

suggestion to “call your mother” depends on your relationship with your

girlfriend (was she reminding or chiding?). And that employee down at

Motor Vehicles who tells you you’re in the wrong line? Was that comment

meant as coaching (this will save you time) or evaluation (you can’t even

follow the simplest instructions, you dolt)?

This dynamic is rampant in the workplace. Performance management

systems are set up to achieve a number of important organizational goals,

including both evaluation and coaching. We evaluate employees to ensure

that they receive fair promotion and pay, that they are clear about incentives

and standing, and that their work is done efficiently and well. We coach to

help people grow and improve, preparing them for greater success on that

next rung up.

All too often, feedback that is offered as coaching is heard as evaluation.

(“You’re telling me how to improve, but really, you’re saying you’re not

sure I’m cut out for this.”) And efforts to elicit coaching from mentors yield

feedback that is laced with evaluation, producing defensiveness and

frustration rather than learning.

WHAT HELPS?

Two things keep us on track: getting our purposes aligned, and separating

(as much as possible) evaluation from coaching and appreciation.

GET ALIGNED: KNOW THE PURPOSE AND DISCUSS IT

Cross-transactions happen when the giver and receiver are misaligned. The

fix? Discuss the purpose of the feedback explicitly. It seems obvious, but

even competent, well-meaning people can go their whole lives without ever

having this part of the conversation.

Most of this book is advice for feedback receivers. But here, we offer

thoughts to both giver and receiver. Ask yourself three questions:

(1) What’s my purpose in giving/receiving this feedback?

(2) Is it the right purpose from my point of view?

(3) Is it the right purpose from the other person’s point of view?

Is your primary goal coaching, evaluation, or appreciation? Are you trying

to improve, to assess, or to say thanks and be supportive? You won’t always

be able to fit the messiness of real life into these clean categories, but it’s

worth trying. Reflecting on your purpose before a conversation takes place

will help you to be clearer during the conversation itself. And even if you

can’t straighten out your purposes, there’s a benefit to understanding that

your purposes are a little confusing, even to you.

During the conversation, check in periodically: “I’m intending to give

you coaching. Is that how you’re hearing it? From your point of view, is

that what you need?” The receiver may respond that it would be nice to

know if she’s doing anything right—a signal that she’s craving some

appreciation and maybe a bit of positive evaluation.

Be explicit about what you think the conversation is about, and be

explicit about what would be most helpful to you. Then discuss and, if you

each need something different, negotiate. Remember: Explicit disagreement

is better than implicit misunderstanding. Explicit disagreement leads to

clarity, and is the first step in each of you getting your differing needs met.

The receiver may need to take the bull by the horns: “You’re offering

coaching, but it would help to get a quick evaluation: Am I doing all right

overall? If so, then I can relax and am eager for your coaching.” Or:

“You’re saying this is coaching, but I’m hearing it as evaluation, too. Am I

right that you’re saying I’m falling behind?”

This is what eventually helped Elsie and her dad. He stopped pitching

and asked, “Elsie, what’s up?” and Elsie burst into tears. Dad learned that

Elsie was actually yearning for appreciation. She had been practicing all

week and expected to wow her dad with her improved skills come Saturday

morning. But when the big moment failed to produce big hits, she was

crushed. She needed Dad’s comforting acknowledgment of her hard work

and disappointment more than she needed his batting tips.

SEPARATE EVALUATION FROM COACHING AND APPRECIATION

The bugle blast of evaluation can drown out the quieter melodies of

coaching and appreciation.

Even if I walk into my performance review determined to learn how to

improve, evaluation can get in the way. If I was expecting an “exceeds

expectations” and receive only a “meets expectations,” then whatever

coaching I receive is likely to go unheard. That’s true even if the coaching

is designed to help me get what I want—an “exceeds” next year. Instead of

hearing the coaching, I’m focused on the thoughts and emotions broadcast

by my internal voice: What about all the times I bailed you out with

headquarters? What’s wrong with you? What’s wrong with me? And what

will this mean for my compensation?

If your organization has formal feedback conversations at yearly or

semiyearly intervals (where, for example, supervisor and supervisee

develop objectives or a learning plan for the coming year, with specific

skills and outcomes targeted), the evaluation conversation and the coaching

conversation should be separated by at least days, and probably longer.

The evaluation conversation needs to take place first. When a professor

hands back a graded paper, the student will first turn to the last page to

check their grade. Only then can they take in the instructor’s margin notes.

We can’t focus on how to improve until we know where we stand.

Ideally, we receive coaching and appreciation year-round, day by day,

project by project. It’s like when we’re driving. If someone ahead of us

doesn’t go when the light turns green, we don’t think to ourselves, I’m

going to collect all the ideas I have for that driver and give them feedback

at the end of the year. We honk now. Now is when that driver needs to

move, now is when they need the “coaching.”

• • •

Understanding whether we are getting appreciation, coaching, or evaluation

is a first step. But even when our purposes are all lined up, feedback can be

hard to understand, and is all too easily dismissed. That’s the topic of the

next chapter.

Summary: SOME KEY IDEAS

“Feedback” is really three different things, with different purposes:

Appreciation — motivates and encourages.

Coaching — helps increase knowledge, skill, capability, growth, or raises

feelings in the relationship.

Evaluation — tells you where you stand, aligns expectations, and informs

decision making.

We need all three, but often talk at cross-purposes.

Evaluation is the loudest and can drown out the other two. (And all coaching includes a bit

of evaluation.)

Be thoughtful about what you need and what you’re being offered, and get aligned.

FIRST UNDERSTAND

Shift from “That’s Wrong” to “Tell Me More”

Irwin, a supervising attorney in the public defender’s office, tells his recent

hire Holly that she gets “too enmeshed” in the personal lives of clients, and

doesn’t maintain appropriate professional distance. “You’re not their

mother,” Irwin warns. Holly leans in: “Look, Irwin, I grew up on these

streets. I know what it means to have someone in your corner really fighting

for you.” “Still,” says Irwin, “you need to establish boundaries.”

Holly says she’ll keep that in mind. But she won’t. It’s hard enough to

take feedback that’s right; Holly’s not going to waste time on feedback

that’s wrong.

In this, Holly is like the rest of us. We don’t want to take feedback that’s

invalid or unhelpful and so, quite reasonably, we screen for that. We listen

to the feedback with this question in mind: “What’s wrong with this

feedback?” And as it turns out, we can almost always find something.

WE’RE GOOD AT WRONG SPOTTING

If you’ve ever received feedback at work—or had an in-law—you are

familiar with the many shapes and sizes of wrong:

It’s 2 + 2 = 5 wrong: It is literally incorrect. I could not have been

rude at that meeting because I was not at that meeting. And my name

is not Mike.

It’s different-planet wrong: Somewhere in the universe there may exist

a carbon-based life form that would have taken offense at my e-mail,

but here on Earth everyone knows it was a joke.

It used to be right: Your critique of my marketing plan is based on

how marketing worked when you were coming up. Before the

Internet. And electricity.

It’s right according to the wrong people: Some see me that way, but

next time, talk to at least one person who is not on my Personal

Enemies List.

Your context is wrong: I do yell at my assistant. And he yells at me.

That’s how our relationship works—key word being “works.”

It’s right for you, but wrong for me: We have different body types.

Armani suits flatter you. Hoodies flatter me.

The feedback is right, but not right now: It’s true that I could lose a

few pounds—which I will do as soon as the quintuplets are out of the

house.

Anyway, it’s unhelpful: Telling me to be a better mentor isn’t helping

me to be a better mentor. What kind of mentor are you anyway?

Why is wrong spotting so easy? Because there’s almost always something

wrong—something the feedback giver is overlooking, shortchanging, or

misunderstanding. About you, about the situation, about the constraints

you’re under. And givers compound the problem by delivering feedback

that is vague, making it easy for us to overlook, shortchange, and

misunderstand what they are saying.

But in the end, wrong spotting not only defeats wrong feedback, it

defeats learning.

UNDERSTANDING IS JOB ONE

Before we determine whether feedback is right or wrong, we first have to

understand it. That sounds pretty obvious, but in fact, we usually skip

understanding and dive in with instant judgments.

“I don’t skip that,” you might think. “I understand what the feedback

means because they just told me what it means. They were giving me

feedback, and I was listening.” A good start, but it’s not enough.

FEEDBACK ARRIVES WITH GENERIC LABELS

Feedback often arrives packaged like generic items in the supermarket

labeled “soup” or “cola.” The labels the giver uses seem clear—“Be more

proactive,” “Don’t be so selfish,” “Act your age”—but there’s actually little

content to them. You would never eat the soup can label, and there’s no

nutritional value to a feedback label either.

Recall Irwin’s advice to Holly: “You’re too enmeshed,” “Maintain

appropriate professional distance,” “You need boundaries.” These are all

labels (even “You’re not their mother”). If Holly followed Irwin’s advice,

what exactly would she need to do differently?

Holly thinks the meaning is clear: Put in fewer hours on each case; get

less upset when you lose; don’t look the defendant in the eye and say you

believe in him; don’t share your own story of struggle and redemption. In

short, care less. Holly isn’t interested in caring less, and she doesn’t buy the

feedback.

These are all reasonable interpretations of Irwin’s labels. He could have

meant these things. But he didn’t. In fact, Irwin thinks making a strong

personal connection with defendants is crucial, and letting them know

you’re on their side even more important. He didn’t mean to set limits on

caring or effort or trust.

What did he mean? Irwin explains: “In this business, we have to be

explicit about boundaries. I’ve overheard defendants asking Holly for ten or

twenty bucks, and I’ve watched her give it to them. Look, if they need ten

dollars, they probably need a lot more than ten dollars. Connect them with

institutional resources to get them squared away. There was a client when I

was starting out who I was very personally attached to, and I equated that

with never saying no to him. Pretty soon, he started taking advantage of me.

And worse, he stopped trusting my professional advice because he saw me

as just another chump he could hustle.”

Would Holly agree with Irwin’s feedback if she understood it? Maybe.

Or maybe not. But at least she’d be in a better position to decide.

Labels do serve some useful functions in feedback. Like the soup label,

they give us a general idea of the topic, and they can act as shorthand when

we return to that topic later. But the label is not the meal.

GIVER AND RECEIVER INTERPRET THE LABEL DIFFERENTLY

Labels always mean something specific to the giver. Think of what bugs

you about someone close to you—your brother, boss, friend, or coworker.

What probably popped into your head is a label:

“He’s so _____ .”

“She’s too _____ .”

“My spouse never _____s.”

“My coworker is so un-_____ .”

In our minds, we have a high-definition movie that captures all that we

mean by those labels—the bad behavior, the angry tone, the irritating habits

that we endure. When we use a label, we’re seeing that movie, and it’s

painfully clear. It’s easy to forget that when we convey the label to someone

else, the movie is not attached. All they’re hearing is a few vague words.

This means that even when we “take” the feedback, it’s easy to misconstrue

the meaning.

Nicholas is told by his boss, Adrianna, to be “more assertive” on the

sales floor. Adrianna rose to manager in part because of her legendary

selling skills, and Nicholas is eager to follow her advice. Later in the day,

Adrianna overhears him pushing a customer to agree to the terms of the

deal “right now, today—before you walk out that door.”

Adrianna is shocked and demands to know why Nicholas was

threatening a customer. Confused, he explains that he was being “more

assertive,” just as she had suggested. Heavens.

Adrianna’s original advice was based on watching Nicholas on the sales

floor relate to customers during a potential sale. She worried that his laid-

back, low-energy persona communicated a lack of interest in both the

customer and the product. By “be more assertive” Adrianna meant

something along these lines: Be energetic. Show some excitement, let your

personality shine through. Knock them out with how engaged and caring

you are. Almost the opposite of how Nicholas understood it.

This “what was heard” versus “what was meant” coaching mismatch is

surprisingly common:

Evaluations can be just as confusing:

Given how often we talk in labels, it’s somewhat astonishing that any

feedback changes hands successfully.

Play “Spot the Label”

In the course of your life, you’ll encounter people who are unusually skilled

at giving you feedback. They’ll say things like, “Let me describe what I

mean and you can ask me questions to see if I’m making sense.” But most

givers aren’t this skilled, and so it falls to you as receiver to work to

understand what’s under the label. The surest way of doing that is to spot

the label in the first place.

Actually, once you’re looking for them, spotting labels is easy; what’s

hard is remembering to look. It’s like counting the number of times

someone says the word “and.” It’s impossible to do if you aren’t

consciously trying to, but once you decide to listen for it, it’s simple. Same

with labels: if you’re listening for them, you’ll hear them everywhere.

After you spot a label, there’s a second step: You have to fight the

temptation to fill in your own meaning. If you already “know” what was

meant, there’s nothing to learn and no reason to be curious. “‘Be more

affectionate’? Excellent, she wants me to initiate sex more often.” But does

the label “be more affectionate” actually mean “initiate sex more often”?

Here are some other choices:

(a) hold hands in public;

(b) pitch in more around the house;

(d) tell me you love me at least once a decade.

The correct answer? You won’t know until you talk about it, and you won’t

talk about it if you assume you already know.

WHAT’S UNDER THE LABEL?

The most common advice about feedback is this: Be specific. It’s good

advice—but it’s not specific enough. What does it mean to be specific, and

specific about what?

To answer that question, we start with an observation: If we strip back

the label, we find that feedback has both a past and a future. There’s a

looking-back component (“here’s what I noticed”), and a looking-forward

component (“here’s what you need to do”). The usual feedback labels don’t

tell us much in either direction.

So to clarify the feedback under the label we need to “be specific” about

two things:

(1) where the feedback is coming from, and

(2) where the feedback is going.

Coming From and Going To

Let’s take an example. You say I’m a reckless driver. That’s the label.

Where is it coming from? A specific time we drove together, the fact that I

call you from my cell when I’m driving, or your fears about that fender

bender I had last year? I’ll be able to more easily decipher the feedback if I

know the answer.

And where is the feedback going? What’s the advice? Do you want me to

stop tailgating or wear my glasses at night or drive more slowly on

neighborhood streets or get more sleep the night before a long trip?

Below, we look in more depth at how to discuss and understand both

where the feedback is coming from and where it’s going. On the “coming

from” side, we’ll examine a key distinction: the difference between the

giver’s “data” (what they observe) and their interpretation (the meaning

they make from what they observe). And on the “going to” side, we’ll

consider the difference between feedback that is coaching, which aims at

advice, and feedback that is evaluation, which clarifies consequences.

These distinctions are captured in this diagram,1 which will make more

sense once you’ve read through the next few pages.

Digging into where the feedback is coming from and going to takes a bit of

practice, but once you do it a few times in real life, it becomes second

nature.

ASK WHERE THE FEEDBACK IS COMING FROM

Feedback givers arrive at their labels in two steps: (1) they observe data,

and (2) they interpret that data—they tell a story about what it means.

They Observe Data

The feedback you get is rooted in the observations of your giver—whatever

they’ve seen, felt, heard, smelled, touched, tasted, remembered, or read that

is relevant. In the academic literature this is called their “data,” although

data in this context goes beyond mere facts and figures. Data can include

anything directly observed: someone’s behavior, statements, tone, clothes,

work product, year-to-date revenue, socks on the floor, rumors around the

office. Here are examples of data that might eventually find their way into

feedback.

Your boss hears you tell a coworker that you’re too busy to help.

Your tennis partner notices that you are no longer able to remember

the score.

Your report did not distinguish between online and brick-and-mortar

sales.

You were quiet at dinner, until you barked at the kids.

Data can also include the giver’s emotional reactions. “When you didn’t

e-mail me back, I was frustrated.” “I’m anxious about what’s getting

dropped when you take half days off.” “When you’re driving and you get so

close to the car in front of us, I am cold-sweat terrified.”

They Interpret the Data

People don’t typically offer their raw observations as feedback. They first

“interpret” or filter what they see based on their own past experiences,

values, assumptions, and implicit rules about the world. So instead of

saying, “I heard you tell Gus that you’re too busy to help,” your boss says,

“You’re not a team player.”

Adrianna has data about Nicholas—his sales pitch, his responses to

customer questions, his tone of voice, his body language. She has lots of

non-Nicholas data as well. She’s seen dozens of salespeople interacting

with customers, and has a whole warehouse of data about her own

experiences with selling over the years.

Without being aware of it, Adrianna interprets what she sees and turns

her direct data into judgments: Nicholas is too laid back. He shows no

apparent interest in his customers—essential for engaging their interest—

and he’s losing sales that he could close.

These are all interpretations of the data. You can’t observe “too laid

back”; laid back is itself a judgment about observed behaviors, and too laid

back is a judgment about the optimal level of laid back. And Adrianna

might observe him failing to make sales, but whether he could close them if

he behaved differently is a guess. It involves assumptions about the

consequences of his approach and a prediction about the future if he were to

change. But until the future arrives, it’s conjecture—it’s Adrianna’s

interpretation of what she sees.

It is said that all advice is autobiographical, and this, in part, is what is

meant. We interpret what we see based on our own life experiences,

assumptions, preferences, priorities, and implicit rules about how things

work and how one should be. I understand your life through the lens of my

life; my advice for you is based on me.

They Confuse Data and Interpretation (We All Do)

You might be thinking, Conversations would be much easier if the giver

just shared the data. Givers shouldn’t say, “Your report was confusing and

lacked depth.” They should share the data: “I noticed that you didn’t

distinguish between online and brick-and-mortar sales. Let’s discuss

that. . . .”

It would be nice if they did, but usually they don’t—not because they’re

trying to be cagey or unclear. The process of moving from data to

interpretation happens in the blink of an eye and is largely unconscious.

Artificial intelligence expert Roger Schank has an observation about this:

He notes that while computers are organized around managing and

accessing data, human intelligence is organized around stories.2 We take in

selective data and make immediate interpretations, resulting in instant

judgment-laced labels: That meeting was a waste of time. Your skirt’s too

short. Those people at the next table can’t parent properly.

If we were asked what we had witnessed, we’d say: “I saw people

parenting badly.” We think that’s the actual data because that’s how we’ve

stored it in memory. But the actual data was the particular way the woman

looked at the baby or the way the man did (or didn’t) respond when the

baby wailed. Bad parenting is not the data; it’s our auto-story about the

encounter.

Now that you’re getting the hang of this, notice that a couple of pages

ago we cited as data the fact that you “barked” at the kids. In fact, “barking”

is itself an interpretation of what you did. Someone else might say you were

curt, sharp, or perhaps even clear. It’s easy to confuse our interpretation

(barking) for the data (what was actually heard).

So feedback givers rarely share the raw observations behind their labels

because they simply aren’t aware of them. It’s up to you to help them sort it

out. Your goal here is not to ignore or dismiss the interpretation. Data is

crucial, but so is the interpretation. At the very least, it’s one person’s view

of things. So you want to get a clear picture of both data and interpretation.

When Nicholas is told by Adrianna that he needs to be more assertive, he

can break it down this way in his mind: “‘More assertive’ is a label. I don’t

know where it’s going or where it comes from. In terms of where it comes

from, I want to understand the data it’s based on—what Adrianna saw or

heard—and how Adrianna is interpreting that information.”

When Nicholas asks for the data, it will take some back and forth.

Adrianna might respond by saying, “What I saw on the sales floor is that

you were too laid back.” That’s moving in the right direction, but as we said

above, “laid back” is not data, it’s an interpretation. Nicholas needs to

understand the observations behind that interpretation in order to

understand precisely what “laid back” looks and sounds like to Adrianna.

This will take some discussion: “It’s my tone? What about my tone? My

body language? Show me. . . .”

ASK WHERE THE FEEDBACK IS GOING

So far, we’ve been talking about your feedback’s sordid past. Now we turn

to the feedback’s future.

Not all feedback has a forward-looking component. You notice that your

tennis partner has trouble remembering the score. If you share that

observation with their spouse, you may not have any advice that goes along

with that. You might—“here are three behavioral changes to watch for that

may signal dementia”—but it also could be that your purpose is achieved

just by sharing the observation with the spouse.

Often, though, feedback will have a forward-looking component. As

we’ll see below, with coaching, that piece is about advice; with evaluation,

it’s about consequences and expectations.

When Receiving Coaching: Clarify Advice

In any given case, you might or might not choose to follow someone’s

advice. But we can test whether advice is clear by asking this: If you do

want to follow the advice, would you know how to do so?

Too often the answer is no, because the advice is simply too vague. “If

you win a Tony award, be sure your speech sparkles.” “Children need love,

but they also need predictability and limits.” “If you want to shine at work,

make yourself indispensable.”

There are two problems with these: (1) We don’t know what they

actually mean, and (2) even if we did, we wouldn’t know what to do to

follow the advice. What does “sparkles” mean, and how would our speech

acquire this magical glow?

So on the receiving end we have to help the giver be clearer. “Sparkles?

Describe what you mean. Show me some examples of speeches that

sparkle. And show me some examples of speeches you think fell flat.” The

contrast is often illuminating and together you’ll home in on what makes an

acceptance speech effective.

Here’s another illustration. Tom is swamped at work, and his friend Liz

suggests he “needs to learn to say no.” This advice as given is both

unhelpful and annoying. All Tom has learned so far is that Liz doesn’t

understand how things work where he works.

But before dismissing the advice, Tom should get curious about what

“saying no” looks and sounds like to Liz. He asks her how he would

implement the advice if he decides to take it. This prompts Liz to describe

her own struggles to say no: “Here’s what I found helpful. I sat down with

my team and shared the dilemma. I explained that I didn’t want to turn

away work, but was coming to realize that I’d become a bottleneck, and

couldn’t do the kind of job I want to on each task.” Sharing the dilemma let

her coworkers in on the challenge, which was beneficial in its own right,

but also gave her team the chance to find creative solutions that she might

not have come up with on her own.

Liz also tells Tom about a new policy she has adopted: “I don’t say yes

or no to a request in the moment. Instead, I ask some sorting questions.”

The questions she finds most helpful are these: “Is this more or less urgent

than what you needed yesterday?” and “Are there pieces of this that are

more important than other pieces, and why?” She then tells the requester: “I

want to take a careful look at what’s on my plate before I get back to you.”

This helps her override her impulse to say yes automatically, and helps

make the workload and priorities a shared problem.

When you discuss advice in this kind of detail you can start to visualize

it, and once it’s visualized, you can see why something that seemed useless

when presented as a “say no” label just might be useful after all.

When Receiving Evaluation: Clarify Consequences and Expectations

It’s not easy to clarify advice, and it can be even tougher to clarify the

consequences and expectations that follow from an evaluation. Why?

Because we’re still vibrating from the impact of the evaluation itself.

Whether we are delighted or devastated, we’re not in a curious state of

mind.

Yet it’s particularly important to understand the forward-looking part of

feedback when it’s evaluation. What does this mean for me? What will

happen next, what is expected of me? Given where I stand, what should I do

now?

Here’s what typically happens:

The evaluation: After a series of tests, Max is told that his ability

to hear certain higher frequencies has diminished by about 80 percent.

What Max says: Really? I’m surprised by that.

What Max later wishes he had asked: What caused the loss, and

what can I do to prevent further loss? What exactly are “higher

frequencies”? How do they matter in hearing? What does “diminished

by about 80 percent” mean? How is my hearing compared with that of

other people my age? Does the context matter for what I’ll be able to

hear? Will this get worse, and if so, how fast?

The evaluation: Margie is not tapped as the new department head.

What Margie says: That’s disappointing. Who got it?

What Margie later wishes she had asked: Can you say more

about what you felt I was missing as you looked at my fit for the job?

What concerns did people have? Do you have suggestions for how I

might fill in some gaps in my experience or skill set? How will this

decision affect my project mix? How about my compensation, now and

in the coming year?

The evaluation: The holidays come and go, and your live-in

girlfriend of three years still refuses to marry you.

What you say: [Nothing].

What you wish you had asked (and maybe still can): What are

you assuming about the future? Are you unsure about marriage, or

about me? Are there things about our relationship that we should talk

about? Do you think you’ll be ready tomorrow? Next year? Never?

What do you need in order to be ready? How about a breakup? Is a

breakup good for you?

You already have the skills for asking forward-looking questions; the trick

is using them. It’s like pulling the rip cord on your parachute. It’s not hard

to do; the key is remembering to do it when it matters. Toward this end, it’s

useful to have a short list of good questions in your back pocket before you

walk into any evaluation conversation.

And, unlike forgetting to pull the rip cord, if you don’t ask the questions

that matter, you can usually come back to have a follow-up conversation

later.

SHIFT FROM WRONG SPOTTING TO DIFFERENCE SPOTTING

So far, we’ve been talking about what’s under the feedback giver’s labels,

and how the receiver can ask good questions to figure out where the

feedback comes from and where it’s going. The feedback giver has ideas in

their head and we’ve been talking about how to get those ideas from that

person’s head into your head.

But we’ve been leaving something out. You aren’t trying to get the

giver’s ideas into your empty head, you’re trying to get the giver’s ideas

into your full head. You have your own views and opinions regarding this

feedback, your own data and interpretations, your own life experiences,

assumptions, and values. All the sorts of things that form the giver’s

feedback in the first place are also going on in your head.

This, in fact, is a big reason we wrong spot: We know that the feedback

is wrong or off target because we have our own experiences and views, and

our views are not the same as theirs. Therefore, theirs are wrong. The only

other choice would seem to be that their views are right and ours are wrong,

but that seems even less likely.

There’s another way to think about it. As receivers, we shouldn’t use our

views to dismiss the giver’s views, but neither should we discard our own.

Working to first understand their views doesn’t mean we pretend we don’t

have life experiences or opinions. Instead, we need to understand their

views even as we’re aware of our own. And that’s almost impossible to do

unless we make a key shift—away from that’s wrong and toward tell me

more: Let’s figure out why we see this differently.

If the reason we see a particular piece of feedback differently isn’t

simply that one of us is wrong, then what is the reason? There are two: We

have different data, and we interpret that data differently. Above, we

explored their data and interpretations in order to understand the feedback.

Below, we’re putting their point of view next to ours and exploring each of

our data and interpretations in order to understand why there is sometimes a

gap between how they see things and how we see them.

DIFFERENT DATA

We each observe different data because we’re different people. We have

different roles, live in different places, inhabit different bodies. We have

different educations and training, different sensitivities, and care about

different things.

Sometimes different data is a matter of access: Your boss knows what

your peers are paid but you don’t; workers in the Cairo office know the

local culture in a way that headquarters in London can’t; when lovers peer

into each other’s eyes, they each see a person the other cannot.

Where you sit in an organization affects what you see. The CEO and the

receptionist have different data because of how and where they spend their

time, whom they talk to, and what they are responsible for. The CEO knows

what’s causing conflicts with the board, frustrating key customers, and

worrying market analysts. The receptionist observes every single person

who comes into the building—board members, vendors, new hires, janitors,

and journalists—and overhears what they talk about in the waiting area.

The receptionist hears the gossip and complaints, and what people do and

don’t like about the CEO’s approach to handling conflicts with the board,

key customers, and market analysts.

Even when we have access to the same data, we tend to notice different

things. We are all moving along the same sidewalk, but the historian may

notice the brickwork, the jogger the impact on her knees, and the fellow in

the wheelchair the areas that are less accessible.

We’re engulfed by information—far too much to take in—and so we

select small samples to pay attention to and ignore the rest. Right now, as

you’re reading this book, pause and notice something you didn’t before.

Maybe there’s background noise, a breeze, or the “fashion sense” of the

person across the way. Until a moment ago you were filtering all that out,

and you probably didn’t realize you were doing so. We don’t notice what

we don’t notice, so we don’t notice that we don’t notice.

Having access to or taking in different data helps explain the trouble

Mavis is having. She’s an attorney on a cross-functional product team that

includes sales, production, and legal, as well as an account manager. Each

team serves a client from start to finish, pitch to performance.

At her annual review Mavis receives blunt feedback from Davis, the

account manager: “You don’t understand the ‘business side’ of the business.

Your laborious legal reviews slow the sales process and we lose out to

fleeter competition.”

Mavis is frustrated by this. These salespeople—and Davis—are just

wrong. As a lawyer, Mavis is aware of certain things that other team

members are not. She knows what the legal issues are, but more than that,

she knows exactly how many deals get litigated and what the settlements

cost the firm in dollars and reputation. And front of mind is her mandate

from the general counsel: “Regulators are cracking down; we must execute

with impeccable integrity. Our sales folks are top-notch, but it’s Legal’s job

to rein them in.” Mavis assumes, unconsciously, that Davis and others see

what she sees. But they don’t. In some cases, they have access to the

information but no interest. In most cases, they don’t even have access:

They aren’t in the legal department meetings with the general counsel and

don’t get the litigation reports.

In contrast, here is what Davis sees. He talks with customers about what

they need and why. He sees the weekly sales reports, including stats on the

pitch-to-close ratio. He hears what other firms are promising customers, and

has learned that often, the terms Mavis rejects on legal grounds are

approved at other firms. Davis also knows the shifting sales landscape.

These days it’s all about price point and efficiency: Beat the market or lose

the deal. No deal, no firm, no Davis, no Mavis. No joke.

Mavis won’t make progress in deciphering the feedback until she asks

this: “Why do we see this differently? What data do you have that I don’t?”

Davis and Mavis each have pieces of the puzzle the other doesn’t and they

can’t put the puzzle together until all the pieces are laid out on the table.

Life would be a lot easier if we routinely asked that question about

different data. But we don’t. Why? Because wrong spotting is so much

more compelling than difference spotting. Being aware of what they see that

we don’t is just not as delicious as listening for how they’re wrong. And

once we spot an error, we can’t contain ourselves; we have to jump in and

set things straight. But we have to fight that instinct. We have to

consciously and persistently choose to ask about their data and share our

own.

Biases Drive Data Collection

There’s another factor that makes difference spotting tough. What we do

and don’t notice isn’t random. If your giver likes you and thinks you’re

terrifically competent, they’re going to notice all the fantastic things you do.

They’ll go out of their way to find them. Your radiance also influences how

they interpret what they see. That mistake you made is simply the exception

that proves just how competent you usually are, and maybe it wasn’t really

a mistake at all.

But if friction develops in the relationship—when the infatuation of new

love fades, the stakes rise, or humidity sets in—biases shift. Now your giver

begins to focus on the things you messed up while ignoring those you got

right. Your “willingness to take risks” is now seen as “risky,” your “firm

hand on the tiller” is now regarded as an unwillingness to let go. Others

seek data that confirm their preexisting view of us, whether that view is

good or bad. It’s human nature.3

Meanwhile, we have biases of our own. All things being equal, we’ll find

a sympathetic story that explains and justifies our own behavior. We

remember what we got right, and as we’ll explore in the next chapter, we

ascribe generally good intentions to ourselves. Ninety-three percent of

American motorists believe they are better-than-average drivers. In a 2007

BusinessWeek poll, 90 percent of the managers surveyed believed their

performance in the workplace to be in the top 10 percent.4

These biases can make difference spotting tougher still since we each

feel it’s the other who is biased. In fact, we’re both biased, and we each

need the other in order to see the whole picture more clearly.

DIFFERENCES IN INTERPRETATION

The second reason why feedback that makes sense to the giver might not

make sense to you is this: Even when you are both looking at the same data,

each of you can interpret them differently.

Janie complains to Ripley that he’s not doing his part to keep the house

clean. After listening attentively, Ripley assures Janie that he will change.

And in his mind he does. But Janie continues to feel the house is a disaster.

The situation is incredibly stressful to her, and she doesn’t understand why

Ripley says he’s helping when he’s clearly not. And Ripley doesn’t

understand why Janie continues to complain now that the problem has been

addressed.

Ripley and Janie have access to the same data but interpret them

differently. When Janie looks around the house, she sees clutter and chaos,

and despairs that her life is out of control. She feels stretched too thin

between work and home and is ashamed when she imagines what her

mother would say if she saw how they live. Ripley looks at the same clutter

and sees a rich family life bursting with the energy and joy of kids being

kids. For him, that chaos is comforting.

Janie and Ripley assume they understand each other because they are

each plainly looking at the same chaotic/comforting house. But here it’s the

interpretation that matters. Ripley won’t understand Janie’s feedback until

he sees the meaning of the mess from her point of view.

Differences in how we interpret what we see are so fundamental to

understanding the feedback we get that it’s worth taking a closer look at a

couple of key factors that are often embedded in our interpretations.

Implicit Rules

One of the primary reasons we interpret data differently is that we have

different rules in our heads about how things should be. But we don’t think

of them as our rules. We think of them as the rules.

Everyone at your old job loved you. Everyone at your new job doesn’t.

They say you’re difficult, but you know you haven’t changed, and the

people you work with seem normal enough. What’s different? The implicit

rules that govern interaction. At your old job, being direct was appreciated:

Knock heads, sort things out. At the new place, you’re supposed to be

“nice.” You’re not a big fan of nice; in your experience, nice equals

indirect, which equals passive-aggressive, which equals frustrating and

inefficient. Which makes you difficult. Now that you understand the

implicit rules, you at least understand why you are seen the way you are.

Organizational culture, regional culture, and even family culture are all

collections of implicit rules for “how we do things around here.” But

everyone has their own individual set as well. Implicit rules can be about

specific matters—like whether being “on time” means seated and ready to

go or just wandering in. And implicit rules can be about more general issues

—like the way life “is” or what it means to be a friend. Such rules often

come in contrasting pairs:

“It’s a dog-eat-dog world” versus “Smile and the world smiles with

you.”

“Conflict is bad” versus “Conflict is healthy.”

“It’s important to be liked” versus “It’s important to be respected.”

Feedback that isn’t making sense can suddenly fall into place when we

understand the implicit rule underlying the interpretations. I assumed that

asking questions at the company meeting showed engagement; I learn that

it’s read as rude and contrarian.

Heroes and Villains

One principle for how we organize our experiences is this: We are (usually)

the sympathetic hero of the story. In his speech to a graduating class at

Kenyon, writer David Foster Wallace observed that there is “no experience

you’ve had that you were not at the absolute center of.” We are each “lords

of our own tiny skull-sized kingdoms.” 5 In our story we are Dorothy, the

Princess, or Rudolph, not the Wicked Witch, the Pea, or any of the other

reindeer.

This complicates feedback.

A son visits his father who is recovering from surgery. Upon arrival he is

horrified to find his father in enormous pain, and the surgeon refusing to

authorize more medication to alleviate it. He marches down the corridor to

report the surgeon’s heartless treatment to the department head. The

surgeon follows, rolling her eyes at her department head to communicate

her assessment: Another difficult family member wasting valuable time

better used to treat patients.

Part of the challenge here is data: Surgeon and son each see the father’s

suffering in light of information the other doesn’t have. The son knows his

father—war hero, football star, stoic. If he’s writhing in pain, that pain must

be intolerable. The surgeon knows the effects of this surgery and the length

of recovery from it—the intense postoperative pain quickly dissipates.

She’s also seen patients become addicted to pain medication, and has

witnessed the toll it takes on them and their families.

What further complicates the situation is that both surgeon and son see

themselves as the hero in the story. Each believes they are protecting the

father from suffering and each sees the other as misguided at best—and in

the heat of the moment, even as something of a villain. Now we’ve got two

heroes fighting over who is wearing the white hat. The feedback they have

for each other isn’t just about medication. It’s a morality play.

ASK: WHAT’S RIGHT?

Difference spotting—understanding as specifically as you can exactly why

you and they see things differently—is a crucial lens through which to take

in feedback. You begin to better understand where the feedback comes

from, what the advice is, how to implement it, and why you and the

feedback giver see certain things differently.

At this point in the process, it can also be useful to make a list of the

ways their feedback might be “right.” We need to be careful here, because

right spotting can inadvertently lead to wrong spotting. If you’re looking for

what’s right, you can fall back into the right-wrong frame and, at least as

often, you’ll find what’s wrong.

So we’re not using the word “right” to mean some final determination

about objective truth. We mean it more as a mindset: What makes sense

about what they’re saying, what seems worth trying, how you can shift

around the meaning in some way that gives them the benefit of the doubt in

terms of how the feedback might be helpful. It’s like walking through a

forest and identifying birds instead of trees. Noticing the birds doesn’t make

the trees “wrong.”

Let’s come back to Mavis and Davis. Mavis can ask why she and Davis

see things differently, but she also might ask what’s right about Davis’s

feedback. What’s right is that speed matters. What’s right is that members

of the sales team are frustrated. What’s right is that some competitors are

(apparently) making different legal judgments about terms. What’s right is

that closing deals matters to Mavis, to Davis, and to the firm. Looking for

what’s right about the feedback is a place where the conversation between

them has traction to explore joint solutions, and one where Davis’s

feedback isn’t so easily dismissed.

WHEN YOU STILL DISAGREE

Sometimes you will get to the point of fully understanding where a giver’s

feedback comes from and what it is they’re suggesting, and you will simply

disagree with it. In fact, now that you really do understand it, their feedback

might seem even further off target or more unfair than before.

That might be a frustrating and difficult place for the two of you to be,

but from a communication standpoint, you’ve succeeded. Your goal is to

understand the feedback giver, and for them to understand you. If you end

up thinking the feedback is helpful, then you’ll take it. If you don’t, at least

you’ll understand where the feedback comes from, what they were

suggesting, and why you’re rejecting it. The same is true of evaluation. The

better you understand the origins and consequences of the evaluation, the

better able you are to explain why you disagree with it.

Being transparent and honest about your reactions is not inconsistent

with being open and curious, by the way. You can say what’s going on in

your head:

Wow. That’s upsetting to hear.

I never would have imagined that.

That is so far from how I see myself—or hope to be seen—that I’m

almost speechless. I want to explain why, but I also want to make sure

that I really understand what you’re saying.

You’re not cutting off the conversation with comments like this, but sharing

your reactions and continuing to try to understand. Having said this, we

should admit that we have a theory here: We figure that the better you

understand the feedback, the more likely you are to find something in it that

is useful, or at the very least to understand the ways in which you are being

misunderstood, and why.

“WHY CAN’T FEEDBACK JUST BE OBJECTIVE?”

It’s reasonable to wonder: If subjectivity and interpretation make feedback

so hard, why not just be objective and stick with the facts? Many

organizations are trying to do just that by developing competency models

and behavioral guides and using formulas and metrics for measuring

performance. These can be helpful to align expectations and clarify criteria.

But they don’t take the subjectivity out of feedback. Nothing does.

Whatever metric you come up with, there will always be subjective

judgments behind that metric: Why is x most important, and why isn’t y

included? There are subjective judgments driving how that metric is

applied: You “meet expectations” based on what I expect. Are those

expectations fair? Yes? No? How do we know? Eventually we arrive at

someone’s judgment.

What about bottom-line profits—aren’t those objective? In one sense,

yes. The number is a number and it’s independent of anyone’s subjective

hopes or beliefs about it. But what does that number mean? Is half a percent

above the market average good or bad? Is double the expected profits good,

or were the expected profits totally off to begin with? And what’s the

relationship between the CEO’s performance and the profits? We can argue

about that, can’t we?

No matter how clearly you define the criteria and the metrics, somebody

has to apply the criteria to a person’s performance, and that involves

making judgments. If advice is autobiographical, so is evaluation. The

evaluation we give people is a reflection of our own (or our organization’s)

preferences, assumptions, values, and goals. They might be broadly shared

or idiosyncratic, but either way, they are ours.

And that’s as it should be. People who are skilled coaches or evaluators

are valuable precisely because their gifts of judgment are strong. An iPhone

app can tell a singer if she’s hitting each note precisely; she hires a voice

coach for his judgment, his experienced point of view. He can help her sing

in a way that moves people. An app can’t tell you whether you are leading

effectively, creating cohesion, persistence, or energy. The people you lead

can.

The goal shouldn’t be to remove interpretation or judgment. It should be

to make judgments thoughtfully, and once made, to have them be

transparent and discussable.

A CONVERSATION WITH COMMENTARY

Let’s look at a conversation in which the receiver has some truth-trigger

reactions, but even so, works hard to understand the feedback. The

background is this: Monisha, the head of HR, has been asked by the CEO,

Paul, to design and conduct an employee climate survey to determine where

the senior executive team could improve. Monisha and her team spend

months collecting data from employees around the globe, and the results are

disquieting.

As Monisha presents the findings to the senior executive team, she and

Johann, the CFO, have a tense exchange:

Johann: Monisha, how many different ways are you going to tell us

that our employees think the executive team is incompetent? We get

it. But I’ll be honest, I don’t put much stock in any of this.

Monisha: Johann, I understand this is surprising, but I think it’s

important that we—

Johann: Garbage in, garbage out. You recall what that means?

Monisha: Do you have a specific question about what I’m presenting?

I can walk you through the methodology.

Johann: I’m sure you have lots of wonderful things to say about your

methodology, but unfortunately, some of us have a business to run.

And with that, Johann walks out.

Paul is chagrined at Johann’s handling of the exchange, but truth be told,

he feels similar frustration and skepticism. The meeting adjourns, and Paul

has the wherewithal to tell Monisha that he knows how hard her team has

worked on the project, and that while he’s unhappy about the results, he’d

like to better understand them. He asks Monisha to stop by the next day to

talk.

PAUL’S PREPARATION: MINDSET AND GOALS

Paul’s initial reaction is that the feedback doesn’t square with his sense of

the organization. But his purpose in the conversation is not to accept or

reject, but first to understand. He’ll seek to remain curious, spot labels, and

clarify Monisha’s data and interpretations. He’ll also share his own thoughts

and views.

THE CONVERSATION

Paul: Monisha, there’s a lot here for us to dig into and discuss. I have

two initial reactions. One is, “Wow, if this is how people are

feeling, then this is a real wake-up call, and I’ve got to understand

this better.” At the same time, I admit that some parts of it don’t fit

with my sense of the climate here. So it’s confusing, which is why

I’m glad you’re here to talk it through with me.

Comment: Nice. Paul’s statement reflects a mindset that is open to

learning, and at the same time, he’s being honest about how he’s

currently thinking and feeling.

Monisha: Paul, you can dismiss this feedback, and I can understand

the inclination to do that, but I don’t think hiding from reality is

going to get us anywhere.

Comment: Not the response he hoped for, but Paul shouldn’t take the

bait. He shouldn’t protest: “I’m not hiding from reality!” He should

stick with the topic: what the results mean and how they can be

helpful.

Paul: The feedback doesn’t match up with what I thought was going

on, but that doesn’t mean that what I thought was going on is

accurate. So this is what I want to investigate and understand.

Monisha: I think the primary finding is that our mid-level managers

are feeling disempowered and out of the loop.

Paul: Let’s get specific. What does it mean that they’re feeling

“disempowered and out of the loop”?

Comment: Well done. Paul doesn’t defend with a comment like, “Well,

we can’t include them in every decision.” Instead, he inquires,

trying to dig under the label.

Monisha: We surveyed everyone from associates to VPs. There was a

pervasive sense that the executive team doesn’t communicate well,

input is not sought, and contributions are not appropriately valued.

Paul proceeds to ask about numbers—how many employees thought this,

how the survey was structured, etc., and Monisha presents that information.

Paul: So, let’s look at a concrete example.

Monisha: A number of people mentioned the ethics initiative. People

were very unhappy that they had to attend a series of ethics

workshops over the course of a year, while the senior leadership

attended a session that was just two hours.

Paul: Well, we don’t call them “ethics workshops” or “ethics

meetings,” but ethics are embedded in our jobs, day in and day out.

I’m constantly meeting with lawyers, compliance people, risk

management people. Ethics and values are at the heart of

everything I do.

Comment: It seems reasonable for Paul to think these things, and

reasonable for him to share them. But in this context, he would be

better served to share them in a way that invites further

conversation. Like this:

Paul: If people are feeling that this is a cynical program, or that senior

leadership doesn’t buy in, I can imagine why they’d feel frustrated.

From my point of view, much of my job is about ethics. I meet with

lawyers, compliance people, risk managers. But the mid-level

people are obviously seeing it differently, and that’s a concern.

Monisha: Yes, they are seeing it differently. Part of it is a matter of

perception, of messaging. But I think there’s something deeper

going on here. A genuine attitude problem.

Paul: I’m not clear what you mean. What do you mean by messaging

versus attitude?

Comment: That’s good. If you don’t fully understand something, slow

things down and ask.

Monisha: Here’s the difference between a messaging problem and an

attitude problem: What was the primary motive behind senior

management’s doing only two hours of ethics work?

Paul: For one, we wanted to send the message that this really matters.

Monisha: But I think the message they heard was that “the senior

team doesn’t really need it.” It’s not the message you intended to

send, but that message is actually an accurate reflection of the

senior team’s attitude.

Paul: Hmm, that’s interesting. So you’re saying we sent a message we

didn’t intend, but which is actually the truth.

Monisha: I think so.

Paul: Just to clarify, do you think that’s the perception that some

people have of me personally? That I think the senior team doesn’t

need ethics training?

Comment: This is a useful question. If it’s not discussed, Paul could

leave the conversation with the impression that Monisha was

talking about others but not him.

Monisha: I don’t have specific information about how people see you

in this, but let me ask you: What is your attitude about senior

management and ethics training?

Paul: It’s as you said. I really do think I spend a lot more time on

ethics and I don’t feel the need to personally participate in the

workshops. But that sends a bad message.

Monisha: So you could do one of two things. You could either be

clearer in explaining why you don’t think senior management needs

this but others do, or you could cultivate a mindset where you

genuinely believe you do need it, and then participate fully. I

imagine even as you hear that, you’re thinking, “I’m just too busy

for that.”

Paul: I am thinking that. Ideally, I could participate, but I’m just too

busy.

Monisha: Which leaves those at lower levels thinking, if senior

management is too busy for this, how important is it? Or

alternatively, maybe they think it is important, which means it’s

important for senior leadership, too.

Paul: Okay, I’m beginning to see how someone might be resentful or

feel that we’re being hypocritical. This is a little shocking. In any

event, this is a lot to think about, and we haven’t even covered most

of the survey. But what we have covered has helped me get a better

sense of how others might see the leadership of the organization

and why.

This conversation between Paul and Monisha is not easy, but it’s important.

The key is purpose and mindset. Paul is not looking to agree or disagree,

defend or accept. He’s trying to understand. It’s not a problem-solving

session, it’s an understanding session. If Paul had followed his instincts, he

would have disagreed with Monisha at the outset, and the conversation

might have ended there. Instead, he listens for labels and works hard to look

under them, and when he’s unsure about what Monisha means, he doesn’t

let it slip by. He asks.

• • •

Giving up wrong spotting isn’t easy, and you don’t have to give it up

altogether. You can still indulge in recreational wrong spotting on the

weekends, with friends over a beer. Argue, accuse, vent, deny—give each

other a hard time. If it’s fun, it’s fun.

But when it matters, when you’re getting feedback that is important to

the giver or potentially helpful to you as receiver, put the wrong spotting

aside. You need to get good at difference spotting, and on occasion, break

out your right-spotting skills. Real learning requires you to take up this

harder but more rewarding sport.

Summary: SOME KEY IDEAS

Feedback is delivered in vague labels, and we are prone to wrong spotting.

To understand your feedback, discuss where it is:

Coming from: their data and interpretations

Going to: advice, consequences, expectations

Ask: What’s different about

The data we are looking at

Our interpretations and implicit rules

Ask: What’s right about the feedback to seek out what’s legit and what concerns you have in

common.

Working together to get a more complete picture maximizes the chances you will (both)

learn something.

SEE YOUR BLIND SPOTS

Discover How You Come Across

Annabelle is a superstar. She’s fast, creative, tireless, and careful. She

remembers birthdays. But what makes her irreplaceable is her impossible

combination of analytic smarts and beguiling, quirky charm.

And everyone on her team is sick of her.

It’s not a crisis. Annabelle is not a bully or a backstabber. Just the

opposite: She cares about her team members and believes they are most

productive when they’re happy.

But they are not happy. Annabelle knows this because her second 360 in

three years tells her this. She’s “difficult,” “impatient,” “doesn’t treat us

with respect.” That’s tough to take. Conveying respect is precisely the thing

Annabelle has been working on since her prior review. And after three

years, here it is again, with no acknowledgment of how hard she’s been

trying.

Annabelle wonders whether something else is going on. Maybe her

subordinates are playing politics or enjoy taking anonymous shots at the

boss. Or maybe it’s projection. Sometimes people fall into a parent-child

relationship with an authority figure to work through unrelated

developmental issues.

Annabelle is right: Something else is going on. But team members are

not playing politics, out to get her, or shadowboxing with absent parents.

Although Annabelle is trying to treat her team members with respect,

she’s sending unconscious signals that undermine her efforts. Tony

explains: “When Annabelle is under pressure, she is difficult to work with.

She says please and thank you, but underneath she’s full of impatience and

contempt. If I go to her office with a question, she rolls her eyes and

answers sharply. Then she’ll show me the door, which, she cheerfully

reminds me, is always open.”

Annabelle knows how she intends to come across. But she is blind to her

actual impact on others.

Annabelle is not alone.

Zoe thinks she’s supportive of new ideas, but is always the first to

shoot down a creative suggestion.

Mehmet takes neutral questions (“Did you have a good weekend?”)

as criticism (“Do you assume I didn’t?”) and is confused about why

others see him as prickly.

Jules keeps talking long after you’ve signaled you need to go. Even,

sometimes, after you’ve already gone.

How can these folks be so oblivious? Is it possible we are this oblivious,

too?

It is.

In fact, there is always a gap between the self we think we present and

the way others see us. We may not recognize ourselves in others’ feedback,

even when everyone else would agree that it’s the conventional wisdom

about who we are and how we are.

Why is it that there is such a gap between our self-perception and others’

stories about us? The good news is that the ways we are understood and

misunderstood by others are amazingly systematic and predictable.

THE GAP MAP

The Gap Map highlights the key elements that factor into the way I mean to

be seen versus the way I am actually seen. Read from left to right, the Gap

Map makes the cause of our blind spots visible.

Let’s start on the far left with our own thoughts and feelings. From these,

we formulate intentions—what we’re trying to do, what we want to have

happen. To achieve our intentions, we do and say things, we put behavior

out into the world. These behaviors have an impact on others, and based on

this impact, others develop a story about our intentions and character. They

then offer some version of these perceptions to us as feedback. By the time

others are describing you—to you—the figure they’re describing may bear

only vague resemblance to the “you” you know. We flinch, we squint, we

shake our heads. We don’t recognize ourselves.

Somewhere in this game of telephone, messages get garbled. By looking

more closely at how information moves across the map, we can pinpoint

where and why.

Let’s use the Gap Map to explain what is going on with Annabelle.

Recall the background: Three years ago, in her first 360, Annabelle

learned that her subordinates felt she wasn’t treating them respectfully. She

was dismayed to discover that they were unhappy and genuinely wants

them to be happier, so she has been working on being “respectful” ever

since.

Now let’s jump onto the map to see what happens. Annabelle’s focus is

on changing her behavior (arrow 3); but her thoughts and feelings (arrow 1)

remain unchanged. And this is a problem.

What are Annabelle’s actual thoughts and feelings about her team? They

are embedded in expectations and assumptions that have accrued over many

years. Annabelle has high standards for herself and high standards for those

around her. This comes from a combination of her temperament and her

early family life, as well as her school and work experiences, where she got

positive feedback for being quietly resourceful. Like a town that slowly

takes shape on the curve of a river, these experiences accumulated into a

village of values, assumptions, and expectations about what it means to be

“good” or “competent.”

Thus we arrive at the cross-currents swirling around her situation:

Annabelle is often dismayed when team members come to her with the

kinds of questions that she would have felt eager to figure out on her own.

She believes they aren’t trying or don’t care enough. As a result she often

feels impatient, annoyed, and disappointed in her team.

This creates a misalignment between her internal thoughts and feelings

on the one hand (arrow 1), and her intentions (arrow 2) on the other. She

believes that she keeps this misalignment hidden, but in fact those internal

thoughts and feelings are leaking into her behavior (arrow 3) through her

facial expressions, tone of voice, and body language.

Her colleagues “read” these leaking thoughts and feelings and then

wonder about Annabelle’s intentions. She sees her intentions as positive: “I

want my colleagues to feel respected and I’m trying so hard to act

respectful.” But her team members tell a different story. They see her as

deceptive and even manipulative: “You want us to think you respect us

when you don’t. Now you’re not just disrespectful, you’re disingenuous.”

Annabelle’s team is now even more unhappy and frustrated, and they

make this clear in her current 360. Annabelle receives the evaluation and

feels shocked, unappreciated, and misunderstood. She and her colleagues

are in a challenging downward cycle.

Below, we’ll explore some of the things that others observe about us that

we can’t—our blind spots—and then examine three “amplifiers,”

systematic differences between how others tell the story of who we are

versus how we tell that same story, which exacerbate the gaps on the map.

BEHAVIORAL BLIND SPOTS

A blind spot is something we don’t see about ourselves that others do see.

We each have our own particular items in our blind spot basket, but there

are some blind spots that we all share.

If we circle on our map the things I am aware of and the things you are

aware of, it turns out that my behavior is in your awareness and mostly not

in my awareness. We all know this about human interactions, and yet

somehow it comes as a surprise that our own behavior is largely invisible to

us.

YOUR LEAKY FACE

Who can see your face? Everyone. Who can’t see your face? You.

We convey a tremendous amount of information through facial

expressions. But our own face is a blind spot. The culprit is human

anatomy: We’re trapped inside ourselves looking out. We know what we

look like in the bathroom mirror, but we don’t know what we look like out

in the world, in motion, interacting with real people, reacting to real events

in our lives.

A decent pair of eyestalks would help—the kind that swivel, like the

ones aliens sport in B movies from the 1950s. With eyestalks we’d get a lot

of insight into why people react to us the way they do: “Oh, now I see why

you think I’m being defensive. I do look defensive.”

Why is so much communicated through facial expression? It’s not

because our faces are so wonderfully clear or expressive; we don’t have a

feelings newsfeed on our foreheads. It’s because most humans are so

wonderfully good at reading other people’s faces. This ability has been in

development for hundreds of thousands of years. Humans succeeded in

evolutionary terms not because we were the strongest or even the smartest.

We succeeded because we could cooperate with one another. We could do

things together (like hunting big game) that we couldn’t do by ourselves.

But we don’t only cooperate; we also compete. And when some people

are trying to help you and other people are trying to hurt you, your social

life gets complicated quick. This cooperation-competition dance rewards

those who can reliably distinguish friend from foe. And that requires the

ability to make smart guesses about the feelings and motivations of others.1

How do we make those guesses? We listen to what others say about their

feelings and motivations, certainly, but that alone isn’t enough. What if

others are trying to deceive us? We needed a way to assess feelings and

motivations that didn’t rely solely on intentional communication. So we

developed the ability to read nuances in faces and tone, and through this we

formulate a “theory of mind”2 about those we interact with.

The human deftness at reading people is most visible in its absence.

Those who fall on the autism spectrum often struggle with exactly this.

They often don’t look others in the eye and can’t read the social cues

transmitted by faces or tone.3 This language that seems so natural to most

people can be a struggle for them to learn.

The rest of us read those cues constantly and largely unconsciously.

Science writer Steven Johnson notes that we can measure “other people’s

moods just by scanning their eyes or the corners of their mouth,” adding

that it’s a “background process that feeds into our foreground processes;

we’re aware of the insights it gives us but usually not aware of how we’re

actually getting that information, and how good we are at extracting it.”4

YOUR LEAKY TONE

Tone of voice also conveys a surprising amount of information about our

feelings. Others get meaning not just from what we say but how we say it.

The precise percentage is impossible to determine (one study suggests 38

percent),5 but the point remains: Tone says a lot.

An actor can say “I love you” a hundred different ways to convey a

hundred different meanings. It can be an expression of passion or

resignation, confidence or doubt. It can be a proclamation or a question. Do

you know I love you? Do I love you? Do you love me? Tone, pitch, and

cadence—what linguists call intonation contours—enhance or subvert

meaning, and transmit rich information about the speaker’s emotions.

Infants sort what they hear through the superior temporal sulcus (STS),

located just above the ear. At four months all auditory information—

whether their mother’s voice or a car horn—is attended to by the STS. But

by seven months, babies start singling out human voices as the only sounds

that trigger attention from the STS,6 and the STS shows especially

heightened activity when that voice carries emotion. This little piece of our

brain is dedicated to taking in language and reading tone and meaning.

But get this: When we ourselves speak, the STS turns off. We don’t hear

our own voice, at least not the same way we hear everyone else. This

explains why we are so often surprised when we get feedback based on how

we said something. (“Tone? I’m not using some kind of tone!”) It also helps

explain why our voice sounds so unfamiliar when we hear ourselves on an

audio recording. When transmitted from a speaker, our own voice gets

routed through our STS, and we suddenly hear ourselves the way others do.

(“I sound like that?!”) We’ve been hearing ourselves every day of our lives,

and yet we haven’t.

Interestingly, this may be part of the reason top opera singers so often

have voice coaches. “We refer to them as our ‘outside ears,’” says soprano

Renée Fleming. “What we hear as we are singing is not what the audience

hears.”7

University College London researcher Sophie Scott speculates that our

“listening” STS brain doesn’t attend to the sound of our own voice in part

because we are so absorbed in listening to our thoughts. Our attention can

focus on only one thing at a time, so we focus on our intentions—figuring

out how to say what we’re trying to say. Annabelle’s focus is on her

thoughts and intentions, not on her behavior and tone.8

So, like our facial expressions, our tone often betrays our thoughts and

feelings in ways we don’t realize. We try to sound relaxed, but come across

as uncomfortable; we mean to sound confident, but come across as

bombastic and insecure; we want to communicate love but instead plant a

seed of doubt.

YOUR LEAKY PATTERNS

It’s easy to understand how the subtle things we do can fall into a blind spot

—a furrowed brow here, an edgy tone there. What’s astonishing is that we

can be unaware of even big, seemingly obvious patterns of behavior.

This becomes apparent to Bennett one evening during a game of

charades with his family. When his five-year-old son mimes a person

pacing while barking into a cell phone, his daughter lights up: “It’s Daddy!”

Bennett winces: “How is that me?” “Because,” she says, “you’re always on

your cell phone!”

He is? Bennett works hard to minimize time on his cell when his kids are

around. But that’s not how they see it: In their minds he is constantly

interrupting family time to make or take a call. One reason for the

difference in their views is the perception of time. When we are on the

phone, we’re immersed in the conversation taking place, and time moves

along. Those around us overhear the dreaded half-a-logue; there’s no story,

just an unintelligible half conversation, and time creeps.

Even the big patterns in our lives that are almost comically obvious to

others may be blind spots to us. Over the last four years you’ve been in six

different relationships. At the beginning of each one, you proclaim to all

your friends: “This is the one.” The relationship moves through a manic

phase, with extravagant trips and adventures, and then settles down for a

few months, and then seemingly out of nowhere, you end it. The only thing

remarkable about any of this is that while your friends could chart the

course of your new relationship on a graph from the get-go, you are 100

percent oblivious to the fact that the relationships share any pattern. In fact,

it’s not until your closest friend does draw you a graph that you start to see

it.

E-MAIL BODY LANGUAGE

Surprisingly, even on e-mail, people try to read emotions and tone. Or more

precisely, despite lacking access to the sender’s face and voice, we retain

the desire to know their mood and intentions, so we gather what clues we

can.

E-mail can provide obvious clues, like ALL CAPS, lots of !!??!s, and

who is suddenly (strategically?) cc’ed, as well as more subtle ones, like

word choice or timing. We wonder why they responded instantly, or why

they waited so long. Was their three-word response pointed or merely to the

point? Was their outpouring of words just thorough, or a sign of

exasperation? We know what they said; we want to know what they meant.

THEY MAY SEE EXACTLY WHAT WE ARE TRYING TO HIDE

The fact that others are always reading our faces, tone, and behavior doesn’t

mean they are always reading us right. They can often tell when what we

say doesn’t match the way we feel, but they can’t always tell quite how.

Sometimes people simply read us wrong. You are feeling shy at cocktail

hour, wishing someone would approach you. But as you linger by the door,

others see you as “aloof” or “too good for the rest of us.” They are picking

up something in your demeanor, but their interpretation is off.

Other times people pick up on exactly the thing we are hoping to hide.

Annabelle’s colleagues are getting it right. The eye rolling, the sighs, the

smile through gritted teeth—she’s trying to hide her true feelings, but alas,

she’s sprung a leak. She doesn’t have to say “I’m disgusted.” Her face says

it for her.9

THREE BLIND-SPOT AMPLIFIERS

Others observe things about us that we literally can’t observe about

ourselves. Our blind spots are their hot spots. But differing observations are

only part of the blind-spot disconnect. There are three dynamics that

amplify the gap between how we see ourselves and how others see us. The

three amplifiers are interrelated, but each is worth examining on its own.

AMPLIFIER 1: EMOTIONAL MATH

Emotions play a huge role in the gap between how others see us and how

we assume we are seen. We subtract certain emotions from the equation:

“That emotion is not really who I am.” But others count it double: “That

emotion is exactly who you are.”

Sasha’s daughter recently left for college, and Sasha feels unexpectedly

bereft. Her friend Olga has been her lifeline, supportive in every way. So

Sasha is stunned to hear from a mutual friend that Olga described Sasha as

“self-obsessed and victim-y.”

Sasha doesn’t recognize herself in that description. Sure, she talks about

feeling lonely, but that’s normal when your only kid goes off to college,

isn’t it? What Sasha isn’t fully aware of is the relentless nature of her

complaints to Olga. For hours on end, days in a row, she talks about her

pain, without noticing the effect on Olga and without ever asking Olga

about her life. (Olga is confronting a difficult time of her own.)

We can empathize with both Sasha and Olga. Sasha is in pain, and Olga

is overwhelmed with being leaned on for support. We understand why

Sasha complains to Olga and why Olga vents about it to a friend. Our point

is not to judge either, but to note the way that Sasha discounts her emotions

from her story of who she is. This emotional math explains Sasha’s reaction

upon hearing the feedback. She’s not just hurt that Olga talked to a mutual

friend, she’s also baffled by the content. It’s just not true, she thinks. Why

would Olga say that?

Anger, too, is often invisible to its owner in the moment. You and your

colleague are under intense pressure to finalize tomorrow’s presentation to

the board. Late in the evening your colleague is struck by a game-changing

idea and excitedly shares it with you. You cut him off: “You want to start

over? At this hour? No #@%& chance!” You exit the conference room

quickly to prevent yourself from saying more.

The next day when your colleague mentions your outburst and the way

you “stormed” out of the room, you are in disbelief: “I’ve never once raised

my voice at you,” you assert. “And I don’t ‘storm.’” And in your mind, you

never have. When we are angry, we are focused on the provocation, the

threat. And it’s the threat that we remember later. For our colleague, our

anger is the threat. It’s not just part of the story, it’s the heart of the story.

Your anger is integral to how your colleague sees you and interacts with

you.

As the example above reveals, strong emotions can seem as if they are

part of the environment rather than part of us. It’s not that I was angry, we

think, it’s that the situation was tense. But situations are not tense. People

are tense.

AMPLIFIER 2: SITUATION VERSUS CHARACTER

Emotional math is really a subset of a larger dynamic. When something

goes wrong and I am part of it, I will tend to attribute my actions to the

situation; you will tend to attribute my actions to my character.10

When I take the last piece of cake at the party, you say it’s because I’m

selfish (character). I say it’s because no one else wanted it (situation). When

I hop on a conference call five minutes late, you say I’m scatterbrained

(character). I say I was juggling five things at once (situation). When I take

another personal day, you say I’m unreliable (character). I explain that I had

to arrange transportation for my ailing aunt Adelaide (situation).

The difference here is not just a matter of cutting ourselves a break. It’s

really an alternate way of telling the story. In extreme cases this helps

explain why a person who is convicted of business fraud, who bankrupted

scores of investors, for instance, can think of himself as an upstanding

member of society: “I’ve always been community-minded and generous. I

never meant to hurt anyone. But I got caught up in something that spun out

of control.” It was the situation, not me.

AMPLIFIER 3: IMPACT VERSUS INTENT

The third amplifier has already been hinted at on the Gap Map: We judge

ourselves by our intentions (arrow 2), while others judge us by our impacts

(arrow 4). Given that even good intentions can result in negative impacts,

this contributes to the gap in the story you tell about me versus the story I

know is “true.”

We see this happening with Annabelle. She is often frustrated by and

contemptuous of her colleagues. But she wants them to feel appreciated and

happy, so she formulates an intention to come across as respectful. She is

trying to do something positive. What could be wrong with that?

What’s wrong is that the impact on her colleagues is negative. Her

colleagues don’t think, Well, the impact was negative, but the important

thing is that you had good intentions. Instead, they notice the negative

impact and conclude that Annabelle is both difficult and insincere.

Annabelle judges herself by her intentions; her colleagues judge her by her

impacts.

This is a common pattern. My story about my interactions with others is

driven by my intentions. I have good intentions—I’m trying to help, to

guide, even to coach. I assume my good intentions lead to good impacts—

they feel helped, guided, and appreciate my efforts to help them grow.

Hence, people must know I’m a good person.

But for those around us, our impact drives their story. Despite my best

intentions, I may have a negative impact on you; you feel bossed around

and micromanaged. You then assume that I’m acting purposefully, or at

least that I know I’m being bossy and don’t care enough not to be. And if I

have negative or negligent intentions I must be a bad person. Now you give

me feedback that I’m bossy and controlling, and I’m shocked and

bewildered. I discard it because it doesn’t match who I am. It’s wrong. And

you conclude that I’m either oblivious to who I am or so defensive that I

refuse to acknowledge what everyone knows is true.

The “fix” is to separate intentions from impacts when feedback is

discussed. When Annabelle gets the feedback that she’s difficult, she insists

that she’s not difficult, saying in essence, “I have positive intentions and

therefore positive impacts.” But she doesn’t actually realize what impacts

she’s having. Instead, she should talk about intentions and impacts

separately: “I’ve been working hard to be more patient [arrow 2, my

intentions]. And yet it sounds like that’s not the impact I’m having [arrow

4]. That’s upsetting. Let’s figure out why.”

Feedback givers also confuse impacts and intentions. Their feedback is

packed with assumed intentions. Instead of saying, “You try to steal credit

for other people’s ideas” (which includes a description of intentions), they

should share the impact the behavior had on them: “I was upset and

confused when you said it was your idea. I felt I deserved the credit for that

idea.” But few feedback givers are this skilled or careful (because they’re

obviously terrible people).

THE RESULT: OUR (GENERALLY POSITIVE) SELF

All of these amplifiers—our tendency to subtract certain emotions from our

self-description, to see missteps as situational rather than personality-

driven, and to focus on our good intentions rather than our impact on others

—add up. And so we get statistics like this: 37 percent of Americans report

being victims of workplace bullies, but fewer than 1 percent report being

bullies. It’s true that one bully can have many victims, but it’s unlikely that

each averages thirty-seven.11

What’s more likely is that at least some percentage of those feeling

bullied are receiving ill treatment from people who are unaware of their

impact. They judge themselves by their intentions (“I was just trying to get

the job done right!”) and attribute others’ reactions to their hypersensitivity

(character) or the context (“Look, it was a tense situation. Anyone would

have reacted that way”). Telling this latter group not to bully others is no

solution, because they don’t realize that they’re doing so. Instead,

discussing the impact of specific behaviors (and prohibiting them when

appropriate) helps the offending party see themselves in the moment and

begins to illuminate their blind spot. And teaching people how to invite and

understand feedback—even if it feels upsetting or wrong—might help

parties on both sides sort things out more successfully.

WE COLLUDE TO KEEP EACH OTHER IN THE DARK

This begs the question: Why don’t people tell us? Why does it take a mutual

friend’s indiscretion for Sasha to hear that she is exhausting Olga’s

sympathies? Why does it take three years and another 360 for Annabelle to

find out that her contempt is still coming through loud and clear?

When we’re on the giving side, we often withhold critical feedback

because we don’t want to hurt others’ feelings or start a fight. We figure

they must already know, or that it’s someone else’s job to tell them, or that

if they really wanted to hear about it, they’d ask.

The result of this withholding is that it’s easy for the receiver to take

misplaced comfort in the absence of corroborating views: If what you’re

saying were true, other people would have told me. Since they haven’t, it

must not be true. It’s just one more reason that seeing ourselves clearly is

such a challenge.

WHAT HELPS US SEE OUR BLIND SPOTS?

Let’s start with what doesn’t help. You can’t see yourself more clearly just

by looking harder. Here’s why: When you do take a good hard look, what

you’ll see is that you don’t have any blind spots and that the feedback is

wrong. You will wonder about the cause of this wrong feedback, and your

mind will slide into an explanation about the ulterior motives or personality

disorders of those who gave you the feedback. We have the same Gap Map

reaction to them as they do to us, just in reverse. We know that we are upset

by wrong feedback and assume that others are giving it to us intentionally.

Which means they must have an agenda or that something is seriously

wrong with them.

USE YOUR REACTION AS A BLIND-SPOT ALERT

Thoughts like the above are so systematic that you can actually put them to

good use. Instead of dismissing the feedback or the person giving it to you,

use these thoughts as a blind-spot alert. When you notice yourself

wondering What was their agenda? and What’s wrong with them?, make

sure your next thought is I wonder if this feedback is sitting in my blind

spot.

ASK: HOW DO I GET IN MY OWN WAY?

To find out, we have to get specific. The feedback we ask for is usually too

general, or others assume that what we are really inviting is appreciation

(and sometimes they’re right). We say something as noncommittal as “So

how am I doing?” or “Do you have any feedback for me?,” which leaves

our giver guessing about what we really want—How are you doing with

what? This project? Our relationship? Your leadership? Your life?—and

how honest they should be. It’s not unlike asking your nine-year-old, “How

was your day?” We shouldn’t be surprised by their less-than-stimulating

response: “Fine.”

Instead, ask (the feedback giver, not your nine-year-old): “What do you

see me doing, or failing to do, that is getting in my own way?” This

question is more specific about the honesty you desire as well as your

interest in the impact you have on others. It’s also a narrower and easier

question for others to answer. They may start timidly (“Well, on occasion I

suppose that you sometimes . . .”), but if you respond with genuine curiosity

and appreciation, they’ll be able to paint you a picture that is clear, detailed,

and useful.

LOOK FOR PATTERNS

Our usual response to upsetting feedback is to reach for other feedback that

contradicts it, in order to protect ourselves. You say I’m self-absorbed?

Then how come I won the community service award last year? You think I

interrupt? Let me stop you right there . . . because I practically had to sit on

my hands last week during your inane presentation.

Instead of whipping out contradictory feedback, take a breath and look

for consistent feedback—consistent in two ways. First, consider to what

extent you are each describing the same behavior but interpreting it

differently (as the table to the left illustrates). Others may be

misunderstanding you (shy versus aloof), or you may be unaware of your

impacts (outgoing versus overbearing). The feedback is not initially what

you expect, but once it’s reinterpreted, you can at least identify the behavior

being discussed.

Here’s a second way to look for consistencies: Ask yourself, Where have

I heard this before? Is this the first time you’ve gotten such feedback, or

have you heard similar things from other people (or the same exact person)

over the years? Patterns offer useful clues about blind spots. If your first-

grade teacher and your first wife both complained about your hygiene, it

might be time to listen.

How I See Me How You See Me

Shy Aloof

Upbeat Phony

Spontaneous Flaky

Truth Teller Nasty

Passionate Emotional

Smart Arrogant

High Standards Hypercritical

Outgoing Overbearing

Quirky Annoying

GET A SECOND OPINION

If important feedback doesn’t resonate, take the whole set of questions to a

friend. Don’t say, “This can’t be true, can it?” Instead, lay out the problem

explicitly: “Here’s feedback I just got. It seems wrong. My first reaction is

to reject it. But I wonder if this is feedback in a blind spot? Do you see me

doing this sometimes, and if so, when? What impact do you see it having?”

You have to let your friend know that you want honesty, and here’s why.

Honest Mirrors Versus Supportive Mirrors

Offering feedback is often called “holding up a mirror” to help someone see

themselves. But not all such mirrors are identical in what they reflect. When

it comes to feedback, there are two kinds of mirrors—Supportive Mirrors

and Honest Mirrors.

A supportive mirror shows us our best self, well rested and under

flattering light. We go to a supportive mirror for reassurance. Yes, how we

acted in that moment was not a pretty picture, but it’s not how we really

look. It’s not a big deal. It’s a bad picture of you. Throw it away. You’re a

good person.

An honest mirror shows us what we look like right now, when we’re not

at our best and our bedhead is bad. It’s a true reflection of what others saw

today, when we were stressed and distracted and leaking our frustration.

“Yes, you really did come across that way. It’s not a good thing.”

Consciously or unconsciously, we often ask the people closest to us to be

supportive mirrors. We share a piece of feedback from the guy in

Purchasing, implicitly inviting our friend to be on our side: “He’s

overreacting, right? He just doesn’t understand I’ve got bigger things to

worry about, right?” Like the Wicked Queen in Snow White, we aren’t

asking the mirror for an honest assessment. We’re asking for reassurance

and support.

Reassurance and support are vital, and our friends and loved ones are

uniquely able to offer it. But this role can put them in a bind: People we rely

on for support are often hesitant to share critical, honest feedback with us.

And that feedback might be helpful: “You know what? I don’t think

everything Purchasing Guy said is right, and I don’t think he said it in the

best way, but I can see what he’s getting at. There are some things you

could work on.”

They are hesitant not out of cowardice, but out of confusion and concern.

They want to do what’s best for us, but aren’t sure whether just being

supportive is the right thing. And yet they also aren’t sure whether and how

to break out of the pattern that has been set. They are right to be concerned.

When someone has been a supportive mirror, we can feel betrayed and

blindsided if they suddenly become an honest one.

You can use the idea of honest mirrors and supportive mirrors to clarify

what you’re asking of your friends. When you hand over your freshly

finished screenplay or show them around your recent renovation, give them

some guidance. In what measure are you looking for honesty or needing

support? Being clear will help avoid crossed wires.

RECORD YOURSELF

For many of us, watching ourselves on video or hearing ourselves on audio

is unpleasant at best. But it can be enormously illuminating, enabling us to

hear our own tone and see our own behavior in ways that are normally

invisible to us.

Audiotaping her weekly brainstorming meeting is what helped Zoe

identify one of her blind spots. She prides herself on nurturing creativity

and was shocked to hear through the grapevine that her nickname among

coworkers is Annie Oakley, as in “she shoots down every idea.” So she

asked if one of her team members could use a smartphone to record a few

of their meetings. Asking a team member to take on the task not only gave

the team some control, it also alleviated worries that she might be collecting

data on them rather than on herself.

Zoe was stunned when she listened to the recording. “The first words out

of my mouth are always negative. Whenever someone offered an idea, my

first move was to challenge it. ‘Here’s what I’m worried about,’ or ‘Here’s

why I doubt that can work.’ It’s so obvious on the recording, but I had no

idea I was doing it.”

Zoe immediately understood what was going on. She genuinely believes

that fresh ideas are the lifeblood of the company, but she also fears wasting

time. Her anxiety about that possibility undermined the conversation, as she

invited ideas but then immediately invoked concerns about going down

unfruitful paths. Armed with this awareness, she and her team are now

working to manage the tension together.

Technology for collecting information about your blind spots is ever

evolving. At the MIT Human Dynamics lab, Sandy Pentland and colleagues

have developed electronic badges and smartphone apps that gather data as

people interact throughout the day. Designed to track tone, pitch, pace,

gestures, and other nonverbal cues, these devices help the researchers

examine how such social signals influence productivity and decision

making.12 Some of their initial findings are startling: Across contexts as

different as business teams, speed-dating, and political opinion polling,

approximately 40 percent of variation in outcomes can be attributed to

social signaling, behavior mostly occurring in our own blind spots. In other

words, the content of the conversation—the business pitch, the five-minute

date, or the polling question—wasn’t all that different. But the successful

pitches, prospects, and pollsters showed aligned social signals with their

counterparts. Talkers and listeners smiled, were more animated, vocal pitch

rose, and gestures got in sync.

By looking only at these signals the MIT researchers can predict

successful or unsuccessful outcomes. Their technology has been used to

help those with autism see and understand social cues; soon they may be

helping us all understand the impact we have as leaders, colleagues, and

family members on those around us, and on the outcomes we get.

FOCUS ON CHANGE FROM THE INSIDE OUT

When Annabelle was given feedback that colleagues found her

contemptuous, she heard the problem as being about her behavior: “They

don’t like it when I act disrespectful, so I’ll work on acting respectful.”

But her colleagues didn’t want her to seem respectful; they wanted her to

feel respectful. Annabelle should assume that people will ultimately read

her true attitude and feelings, whatever they are. So she has two choices.

She can either (1) discuss her true feelings—explain why she is frustrated

with her colleagues, where her expectations come from, and what would

help; or (2) work hard to change her feelings—not how she comes across,

but her genuine underlying feelings.

Option (1), perhaps surprisingly, can take a lot of the pressure off.

Annabelle can make her expectations explicit and then problem solve with

the team: Are the expectations realistic? If so, how do we get team

members to meet them? And what is Annabelle doing that might be

hindering them from stepping up? If she’s second-guessing their efforts, it

won’t take long for them to stop first-guessing.

Option (2) requires Annabelle to negotiate with her own feelings and

attitudes. It’s not about pretending or concealing, it’s about developing

authentic empathy and appreciation for her colleagues. She may need to see

her colleagues’ efforts in a new way, get to know them better as people, or

work harder to see what they are doing well.

As she negotiates with herself, she can enlist the support of her team: “I

get frustrated easily when I’m under pressure. I’m learning that I show it in

ways I didn’t realize. I’m working on reacting better under pressure, and

you can help me by pointing out my reaction in the moment.”

Just acknowledge the pattern that everyone already sees, and be clear that

you’re trying hard to change.

HAVE A PURPOSE

This chapter is subtitled “Discover How You Come Across.” We should be

clear that we mean that in the context of someone having feedback for you.

We aren’t urging you to make sure you know everything about how

everyone sees you, whether you want to or not, and whether they want you

to or not.13 People have all sorts of complex thoughts about us; some of

their negative thoughts would surprise us, and some of their positive

thoughts might surprise us even more.

In most circumstances, knowing that someone has a generally favorable

view of us is all we need to know. If not the whole story, it’s true enough,

and it serves us well to feel that other people think well of us. It helps us

feel comfortable, confident, and happy.

That reasoning breaks down, though, when someone is trying to give us

feedback. That’s when it’s important to work to learn more about how they

see you on this front, either because it will help them or because it will help

you. That’s when illuminating your blind spots makes a difference.

Summary: SOME KEY IDEAS

We all have blind spots because we:

can’t see our own leaky faces

can’t hear our tone of voice

are unaware of even big patterns of behavior

Blind spots are amplified by:

Emotional Math: We discount our emotions, while others count them

double.

Attribution: We attribute our failure to the situation, while others attribute it

to our character.

Impact-Intent Gap: We judge ourselves by our intentions, while others

judge us by our impact on them.

To see ourselves and our blind spots we need help from others.

Invite others to be an honest mirror to help you see yourself in the moment.

Ask: How am I getting in my own way?

RELATIONSHIP TRIGGERS

and the challenge of

Relationship Triggers (and the challenge of WE)

In the prior section, we looked at truth triggers and the challenge to see the feedback

clearly. In this section we examine relationship triggers. Here, our reactions are caused not

by the feedback itself, but by our relationship with the person giving us the feedback. This is

the challenge of we. The question of who is offering us feedback doesn’t seem like it should

matter. Regardless of the source, the advice is either wise or foolish, the ideas worthwhile

or worthless. But it does matter. We are often more triggered by the person giving us

feedback than by the feedback itself. In fact, relationship triggers may be the most common

derailers of feedback conversations.

In chapters 2, 3, and 4, we looked at truth triggers—ways we get thrown off by the content

of the feedback. In chapters 5 and 6, we explore the common reasons we get thrown off

based not on the what of feedback, but on the who, where, when, why, and how. Each of

which really just comes back to the who. “You’re telling me this now, at my best friend’s

wedding? Seriously?” We disqualify that feedback because how, when, where, and why it

arrives says something damning about the who. Therefore, I don’t have to listen.

In chapter 5, we observe that we can dismiss feedback because of how we feel treated by

the giver—for example, they are being unfair or disrespectful. And we can also dismiss

feedback based on what we think about the giver—perhaps we believe they have no

credibility, or we suspect they have bad intentions. We’ll show you how you can learn and

benefit from feedback even when it’s delivered poorly or comes from someone you don’t

like or trust. And we’ll take a look at why in the world you’d want to.

The feedback we talk about in chapter 5 could be about anything—how to eat healthier, or

your revenue numbers this year. In chapter 6, we look at feedback that is actually created

by the relationship itself. Feedback is often prompted by differences, incompatibilities, or

friction between you and the giver. The giver is suggesting that if you would change (“Be on

time!” or “Quit being so controlling!”), the problem would be solved. We often react by

asserting that we are not the real problem, they are. The problem is not that we are five

minutes late; it’s that they are so uptight. And we wouldn’t need to be so controlling if they

would get off their backside and take some initiative.

So they think we are the problem and we think they are the problem. We’ll show you why

feedback in relationships is rarely about you or me. It’s usually about you and me and our

relationship system. Understanding relationship systems helps you move past blame and

into joint accountability, and talk productively about these challenging topics, even when the

other person thinks this feedback party is all about you.

As you read the next two chapters, have a couple of feedback givers in mind from your own

life. What makes hearing feedback from them so hard, and what might you learn from them,

even so?

DON’T SWITCHTRACK

Disentangle What from Who

In an episode of the HBO sitcom Lucky Louie, Louie comes home after a

hard day’s work at the auto body shop for a long-anticipated romantic

weekend with his wife, Kim. He has a gift for her—red roses—which he

presents with a flourish. Kim looks disappointed, and after a moment she

gives Louie some advice.

Kim: Listen. Try not to take this the wrong way, okay? But if we’re

going to be married for the next 30 years, I need you to know that

red roses are not my thing. I really don’t like red roses.

Louie: Okay, well, can I critique how you just told me that? It’s not

that big a deal. I just think that you should have thanked me for the

flowers first, and then said the thing about the roses.

Kim: I’ve told you before that I don’t like red roses. Remember that?

Louie: But still, I was thinking of you, so I bought you flowers.

Kim: If you were thinking of me, you wouldn't have gotten me red

roses.

Louie: Oh, come on, Kim, I brought you flowers. That's a nice thing!

You say thank you. It's called being polite.

Kim: You know what would be polite? If when I told you things, you

actually listened!

Louie: Hang on, all I'm asking for here is a tiny bit of gratitude. So

maybe they're not your favorite kind of flowers—

Kim: No, I didn't say not my favorite, I said, Don't bring me red roses.

Louie: What is wrong with you? Are you allergic to saying thank you

to people?!

Kim: How do you expect someone to thank you for giving them

something they specifically told you they don’t want?

Louie: You know what’s a better question? How you get given red

roses and turn around and act like this?!1

Argument: 1. Romantic Weekend: 0.

What happened? The surface story is clear enough: Louie gives Kim

roses, Kim gives Louie feedback, and then they have a fight. Of course,

their reactions suggest that this conversation is about something deeper: It’s

not about the roses, it’s about the relationship.

RELATIONSHIP TRIGGERS CREATE SWITCHTRACK

CONVERSATIONS

Kim’s feedback trips a relationship trigger for Louie.

Her feedback is simple: I don’t like or want red roses. More important,

she’s frustrated because Louie should know she doesn’t like red roses—not

because she expects him to read her mind but because she’s told him so,

many times. The roses are Exhibit A for her long-standing feeling that

Louie doesn’t listen to her. Later in the episode Kim explains:

When I tell you things and you don’t listen, it’s a huge insult to me. It

makes me feel like I don’t matter.

How does Louie respond to Kim’s feedback? He changes the subject,

entirely and completely. But wait—Kim is talking about red roses, and

Louie is talking about red roses. Same topic, right?

But it’s not. Kim is using the red roses to raise how she feels unseen and

unheard. Louie walks right past the topic of how Kim feels and talks instead

about his own topic: how he feels unappreciated. There’s nothing wrong

with that reaction or that topic, but it has zero overlap with Kim’s topic.

Now we have two people giving feedback and no one receiving it.

The dynamic that Louie and Kim have fallen into is so common that

we’ve given it a name: a switchtrack conversation. Their conversation gets

smoothly shifted, as if by railroad switch, from one topic to two. Soon they

are each heading in their own direction, moving farther and farther apart.

A key part of the dynamic here is that the person receiving the original

feedback is unaware that they are changing the subject. Louie does not

switch topics to avoid Kim’s feedback. He switches topics because he feels

triggered. When Kim says she doesn’t like red roses, Louie feels hurt and

frustrated. For him, Kim’s lack of appreciation is the topic of the exchange.

His emotions shunt the conversation sideways, and Louie heads off down

his own track.

SWITCHTRACKING DEFEATS FEEDBACK

Switchtracking has two potential impacts, one good and one bad. The

potentially positive impact is that the second topic being put on the table

may be important—sometimes more important than the feedback that

triggered it. We may have hesitated to raise it earlier, but here it is, finally

out in the open. And now that it’s out in the open, we can deal with it.

The negative impact is that because we now have two topics, the

conversation gets tangled. Dealing with two topics is not a problem in itself

—we can address two, twelve, or twenty in a single sitting. But with

switchtrack conversations, we don’t realize there are two separate topics,

and so both get lost as we each hear the other person through the filter of

our own topic.

When Kim says: “How do you expect someone to thank you for

something they specifically said they don’t want?” her topic is “Louie not

listening,” and this statement says so. But if the comment is heard through

Louie’s “Kim is ungrateful” topic filter, then the statement itself is further

evidence of Kim’s ingratitude. What do Kim and Louie learn in this

feedback conversation? They each “learn” what they already know: that

Louie won’t listen even when being told he doesn’t listen. And that Kim is

selfish and rude, and Louie just can’t win.

SILENT SWITCHTRACKING CAN BE WORSE

Sometimes the second track in a switchtrack isn’t out in the open, but runs

underground. Our reactions remain locked in our heads, silently shouting

objections while we resentfully endure the criticism from our stepdaughter

or department head. We’ve long since switched to our own topic: Wow,

you’re telling me to calm down? You’re the most tightly wound person I’ve

ever met in my life. And I guess I now have to add un–self-aware. We then

walk away and vent our frustrations to others. (“Is Jenna the most neurotic

person on the planet, or just this hemisphere? I can’t decide.”) We

triangulate the conflict and short-circuit learning in all directions.

TWO RELATIONSHIP TRIGGERS

So the switchtrack dynamic has four steps: we get feedback; we experience

a relationship trigger; we change the topic to how we feel; and, step four,

we talk past each other. To get better at managing our impulse to

switchtrack, we have to get better at understanding the relationship triggers

that create these impulses. Below, we look at two key kinds of relationship

triggers: (1) what we think about the giver, and (2) how we feel treated by

the giver.

WHAT WE THINK ABOUT THEM

There are people we admire so much that their actions and advice take on a

golden glow. Our default assumption is that their input is wise, thoughtful,

deep—just the thing we need to hear. We hang on their every word and

strive to emulate them. Their feedback comes preapproved.

What We Think About Them

Skill or Judgment: How, when, or where they gave the feedback.

Credibility: They don’t know what they’re talking about.

Trust: Their motives are suspect.

Then there’s everybody else. Feedback from these others may not be

predisqualified, but we are on higher alert. We can disqualify the giver on

any number of grounds—the most common involving trust, credibility, and

the (lack of) skill or judgment with which they deliver their feedback. And

once we disqualify the giver, we reject the substance of the feedback

without a second thought. Based on the who, we discard the what.

Skill or Judgment: How, When, or Where They Gave the Feedback

The first and easiest target is how, when, and where the feedback is offered

(all of which reflect directly on the who). The giver fails to handle the

giving with appropriate care; how they give it shows a lack of skill; when

and where they give it shows a lack of judgment.

“Why would you say that in front of my fiancé?”

“You waited until now to bring this up?”

“You should have thanked me for the flowers first, and then said the

thing about the roses.”

We are (often justifiably) outraged by where, when, and how, and a classic

switchtrack ensues. We engage in a heated exchange about how

inappropriate it was that our anger management problem was raised in front

of a client, but never circle back to discuss the actual anger management

problem. I’m on my track, you’re on yours, and we soon lose sight of each

other.

Credibility: They Don’t Know What They’re Talking About

We can also react to the giver’s lack of expertise, background, and

experience. He’s never started a business; she’s never coached organized

soccer. He has lived his whole life in Dodge City, Kansas, and is offering

his “wisdom” about the immigrant experience. They are full of parenting

pointers because they aren’t parents. Why should we listen to them?

These are all reasonable reactions. Yet the fact remains that we can often

benefit from the insight of newcomers or outsiders unencumbered by

knowledge of “the way things are done.” They might ask just the right

“naïve” question, or offer a unique perspective. It’s not entirely surprising

that the MP3 technology that revolutionized the music industry, and the

smartphone technology that changed telecommunications, came from

outside those worlds. New ideas often come from those without traditional

credibility, who are freer to think outside the box precisely because they

don’t know there is a box. History abounds with examples of battles won

thanks to the insight of a junior corporal with a deft suggestion.

Even in personal relationships, a fresh perspective can cut through a

complicated history and the elaborate rationales we construct over time. A

new friend can see ways in which an old friend isn’t being fair, or make a

suggestion that could ease a dynamic between you and your half brother

that is entrenched in habit and history. When someone asks, “Why do you

let your business partner put you down so much?,” pause before you

explain what she’s like and how you have to know her to understand. And

consider whether their ideas for changing the situation just might help.

The other kind of credibility issue that triggers reactions has to do with

values and identity. We don’t want to be the kind of leaders—or the kind of

people—that they are. So why would we take their coaching?

Fair enough. If they’re coaching you on how to deceive your spouse or

how to embezzle from the pension fund, by all means, proceed with

caution. Yet more often other people’s coaching is aimed at helping you

navigate the complex environment you share, or dealing with roadblocks in

the distance that they have already seen up close. There are often aspects of

their counsel that are helpful or even wise, even as you choose to

implement them in a way that is more consistent with your own values.

It’s not that credibility and background knowledge are irrelevant. Their

experience is a factor in weighing the feedback’s usefulness, but don’t use it

to automatically reject their counsel.

Trust: Their Motives Are Suspect

“Trust” in this context refers to the giver’s motivations, and is fundamental

to our willingness to consider other people’s coaching, accept their

evaluation, or believe their appreciation genuine.

The Rabbit Hole of Intentions

You want to hurt me.

You’re projecting your own issues onto me.

You want to show me who’s boss.

You’re playing favorites.

You’re threatened by me.

You have no filter and can’t stop blurting out stupid things.

You’re just jealous.

You’re building a case against me.

You’re being nice, but not honest.

You’re trying to control me.

You’re more than a little nuts.

Mistrust can get triggered in several ways. Sometimes we fear that the

giver’s intentions are nefarious. We don’t trust the feedback because the

person giving it seems out to undermine or control us. Or we may simply

doubt that they have our best interests at heart. Or they might not care about

us one way or the other—they’re giving us feedback so they can check that

obligatory box.

That’s fine, we’ll check “feedback received” and be on our way.

Other times you wonder if they’re telling the truth. Are they saying nice

things about your work because they think it’s good or because they’re too

wishy-washy to tell you how they really feel? And what are they saying

behind your back?

Intentions are rarely explicitly stated, and even when they are, we may or

may not believe them. You say you are “just trying to help,” but it sure

seems as if you are “just trying to get me fired.” The challenge here, as

we’ve seen, is that intentions are invisible. They are locked up in the giver’s

head, where even the giver may not be fully aware of them. And this makes

intentions tricky. We care deeply about others’ intentions but we simply

can’t know them.2 And so we go down the rabbit hole of trying to guess,

and burrow around in the dark. When we finally emerge, we’re still

uncertain, or worse, we think we know their intentions when we don’t. It’s

not that we should therefore assume good intentions. We should just be

aware that we don’t know, which makes arguing about intentions a

conversational dead end.

And besides, the question of intentions is a separate topic from the

accuracy or helpfulness of feedback. The giver might be jealous or mean-

spirited or totally nuts, and yet their feedback might be dead right, the most

useful thing we’ve heard in months. Or maybe they really and truly do have

our best interests at heart. But their suggestion that you wear those yellow

leather leggings to the office? Still a bad idea.

So treat trust and content as separate topics, because they are separate

topics. Explore what might make sense about the feedback itself. And you

can share with the giver the impact that their feedback has had on you,

without insisting that you’re sure of their intentions. Don’t use the

relationship trigger of trust to automatically disqualify the feedback.

SURPRISE PLAYERS IN THE FEEDBACK GAME

Relationship triggers based on what we think about a giver help explain

why our best friends can tell us things that others cannot. If we trust them

and think they have credibility on a particular topic (on career advice but

not love life advice, or vice versa), we will be inclined to be more receptive

to their feedback.

Relationship triggers also explain why sometimes those closest to us

can’t give us feedback, no matter how well intentioned or accurate.

Strangers

Fred was leaning on his crutch, studying the café menu, when a woman

tapped him on the shoulder. “I don’t mean to intrude,” she said, “but I

notice that you’re using those crutches the same way I used mine last year.

Apparently it’s not the best way to handle them, and I ended up injuring my

hip. I spent six weeks recovering from the original injury and six months

recovering from the misuse of the crutches.”

The woman showed Fred how to adjust his grip and stride, and he arrived

home excited to show his girlfriend Eva what he’d learned. Eva was

indignant: “I’ve been telling you that for weeks. You ignore me but the

minute some stranger says the same thing, you’re sold?”

Indeed. The advice was identical, but the person giving it changed. And

that removed the relationship trigger that blocked the feedback when it

came from his girlfriend. In Fred’s view, Eva rather enjoys bossing him

around, something he enjoys rather less. And she has never been on

crutches, so what does she know? The café stranger? A whole different

story. Why would the stranger say anything unless she was trying to help?

And she established right up front that she had walked in Fred’s (orthotic)

shoes. Credibility. No ulterior motives. Feedback taken.

Those You Least Like and Who Are Least Like You

The other surprisingly valuable players in the feedback game are the people

you find most difficult. That woman down in Procurement who constantly

pesters you for paperwork? The client overseas who seems to think you’re

an idiot? That relative who makes every family gathering all about her,

including funerals? That’s who we’re talking about.

You don’t trust them. You don’t like them. They say all the wrong things

at all the wrong times. Why in the world would you listen to feedback from

them?

Because they have a unique perspective on you. We tend to like people

who like us and who are like us.3 So if you live mostly without friction with

your mate or work well with a colleague, chances are you have similar

styles, assumptions, and habits. Your preferences and expectations may not

be identical, but the two of you fall into an easy complementariness.

Because of this ease, you are often at your best and most productive with

them.

They can’t help you with your sharpest edges because they don’t see

those edges. The woman in Procurement does. She thinks you’re arrogant,

flip, irresponsible. Unpleasant, curt, avoidant. You know the problem is her

—she brings out your worst. But it is your worst. It’s you under pressure,

you in conflict.

It’s here that we often have the most room to grow. When we are under

stress or in conflict we lose skills we normally have, impact others in ways

we don’t see, are at a loss for positive strategies. We need honest mirrors in

these moments, and often that role is played best by those with whom we

have the hardest time.

If that overseas client thinks you’re an idiot, then there’s something

going on that you’re not “getting,” and without her help, you’re not going to

get it. It may be a cultural difference that you need to understand if you’re

going to be effective in her market. It may be that your tone and word

choice are upsetting her in ways you don’t realize. That’s worth figuring

out. And you’ll need her help to do it.

Want to fast-track your growth? Go directly to the people you have the

hardest time with. Ask them what you’re doing that’s exacerbating the

situation. They will surely tell you.

HOW WE FEEL TREATED BY THEM

How We Feel Treated By Them

Appreciation: Do they see our efforts and successes?

Autonomy: Are we given appropriate space and control?

Acceptance: Do they respect or accept who we are (now)?

The first type of relationship trigger derives from what we think about the

feedback giver. The second type comes from how we feel treated by them.

Whether professional or personal, casual or intimate, we expect many

things from our relationships. Among these there are three key relationship

interests that commonly get snagged on the brambles of feedback: our

needs for appreciation, autonomy, and acceptance.

Appreciation

Since her stroke three years ago, you have been your sister’s primary

caretaker. It has been a challenge. As your exhaustion grows, your patience

is stretched thin. This morning you snapped at your sister, and her son

happened to be nearby. And he snapped, too: “Don’t ever talk to Mom that

way!”

Fine. He is right. But where’s the appreciation for years of caretaking?

Where’s the acknowledgment for showering and changing her every day;

where’s the appreciation for how you’ve fed her and held her and carried

her? You understand why your nephew was upset, but in the bigger picture,

his feedback is deeply, maybe even hatefully, unfair and out of balance. At

least, this is how it feels to you in the moment.

We can be triggered even when a relationship is good and the matter at

hand is minor. Ernie gladly covered for Samantha when she took a few days

off to visit colleges with her son. When Samantha returned, the first thing

she did was question why Ernie hadn’t managed to call a client back.

There’s no simmering history between them, but Ernie is triggered. He

doesn’t say, “This feedback is great because it’s helping me learn how to

deal with your clients in a more timely fashion.” He says, “What is wrong

with you?!” Not because Samantha’s feedback is wrong, but because to

Ernie it feels unbalanced. And because his expectations of a warm thank-

you were so sharply overturned.

This kind of swift reversal is also part of what triggers Louie: I am doing

something nice for you, and your reaction is not just neutral, it’s negative.

In a flash Louie goes from happy to hurt. Whether Kim’s feedback is valid

or not, he can’t hear it. He’s still smarting from the unexpected sting.

Autonomy

Autonomy is about control, and in telling us what to do or how to do it,

givers can trip this wire in an instant. Often our boundaries are invisible—to

others and even to us—until they have been violated. That’s when the

contours suddenly crystallize.

As kids we’re constantly negotiating these boundaries with our parents

—“I’m in charge of the Cheerios on my highchair tray and I’ll sweep them

onto the floor if I damn well please.” We continue to negotiate these

boundaries as adults. Your boss does not get to give you feedback on your

e-mail to your team before you send it out. It’s your e-mail to your team

about your Cheerios marketing campaign. At least, that’s how you see it.

We are particularly sensitive to encroachments that seek to control who

we are. “Back off,” we want to say. “I control my attitudes; I control my

behaviors; I control my personality; I control how I dress and walk and talk.

When you give me this sort of feedback you are not only violating

boundaries, you are misunderstanding your role in my life.”

My autonomy map and your autonomy map will occasionally clash,

raising questions about who gets to decide. That’s a negotiation, and an

important set of conversations to have, clearly and explicitly. We can

imagine situations where we would empathize with the feedback receiver

(“If I have to clear every e-mail to my team with headquarters, we’ll never

get anything done”) and others in which we’d side with the feedback giver

(“You’re new here, and it’s my responsibility to make sure your e-mails

comport with our organization’s norms”). Whichever way we decide,

simply realizing that we’re triggered not by the advice itself but by being

told what to do will help us address the correct topic. We can have an

explicit conversation about the appropriate boundaries of autonomy instead

of a pointless argument about whether your suggested grammatical changes

to my e-mail make sense.4

Acceptance

It’s the paradox at the heart of many feedback conversations: We find it

hard to take feedback from someone who doesn’t accept us the way we are

now.

My dad is full of advice. I might be able to hear it if, for once, he’d

just say, “You know, kid, you turned out okay.”

Nothing I do is ever good enough for my boss. My very presence on

her team seems to agitate her, but she knows she needs what I do.

My ex, at the end of the day, simply wanted me to be a different

person.

This is complex terrain. The givers want us to change in some way. We

want to know that it’s okay if we don’t. You say you love me in spite of my

flaws; I want you to love me because of them.

One dynamic that contributes to the challenge is that the giver and

receiver may define acceptance differently. What to the giver seems like a

recommendation for a small behavioral tweak may feel to the receiver like a

rejection of Who I Am.

That’s what’s going on with David and Cheng. David often gives Cheng

advice on climbing the ladder of success: “There’s no one more talented

than you, but in this industry, image is as important as substance. If you

want to get plucked from the chorus line, you’ve got to kick high.”

Cheng finds David’s coaching inane and insulting. He explains to David

that that’s not who he is. If he advances it will be on merit, and if he doesn’t

advance, at least he lived his life his way. It’s not worth sacrificing the

humility and authenticity at the core of his identity to become a phony, self-

promoting windbag.

David finds Cheng’s reaction puzzling. In his mind, he is suggesting a

small adjustment to Cheng’s behavior that would pay big dividends. It has

nothing to do with “who Cheng really is.” What he’s recommending is

superficial—that’s the point. David wonders whether Cheng’s “this is who I

am” mantra is really just a way to insulate himself from criticism.

That raises the second sticky issue around acceptance and change. When

we say, “accept me as I am,” are we really just asking for immunity from

critique? Forgot to pick up the kids after school? That’s just who I am! Lost

my temper in front of our new funders? Just me being me! Crashed the car

after too many drinks at the party? C’est moi!

While we all need to feel accepted as we are, we also need to hear

feedback—particularly when our behavior is affecting others. Being

accepted isn’t an escape hatch from responsibility for consequences, as we

discuss in more detail in chapter 10. So, seek acceptance. And work to make

amends with the kids and with the funders (and with the car).

RELATIONSHIP TRIGGERS: WHAT HELPS?

The goal here isn’t to dismiss the relationship issues that trigger reactions.

As we’ve said, sometimes the second topic is at least as important as the

first. The goal is to get better at realizing when we’ve got two topics on the

table, and to address each on the merits rather than letting one get tangled

up in, or cancel out, the other.

There are three moves that can help us manage relationship triggers and

avoid switchtracking. First, we need to be able to spot the two topics on the

table (the original feedback and the relationship concern). Next, we need to

give each topic its own conversation track (and get both people on the same

track at the same time). Third, we need to help givers be clearer about their

original feedback, especially when the feedback itself relates to the

relationship.

SPOT THE TWO TOPICS

The first skill is awareness. We can’t give each topic its own track unless

we are aware that there are two topics. Let’s take spotting practice. Find the

switchtrack in the following examples:

Daughter: Mom, you never let me go out. You treat me like a child.

Don’t you trust me?

Mom: You should be grateful you have a mother who cares.

Topic one is the daughter’s view that her mother treats her like an

untrustworthy child. The mother responds by switchtracking to topic two:

her feeling that her daughter is ungrateful (an appreciation trigger). Better

for Mom to stay on topic one. She could ask about the daughter’s views:

“Let’s talk about how you’d like to be treated.” Or she could clarify her

own thinking about trust: “I want to trust you, and that needs to be

earned. . . .” Once they have this conversation, Mom could circle back and

raise the question of whether her daughter is grateful and what that means

to each of them.

Boss: You didn’t meet your sales numbers.

Salesperson: Why are you telling me this right before I head out on

vacation?

Topic one is the sales numbers. Topic two is the appropriate time to raise

the sales numbers (skill/judgment of the giver).

Wife: This place is a mess! You were supposed to have the kids fed

and bathed by the time I got home. Now we’ll be late for the

recital!

Husband: Don’t use that tone with me. I’m not the dog!

Wife: That’s where you want to go with this? You did precisely none

of the things you promised, and you’re making this about me?

Husband: That! That tone right there is exactly what I’m talking

about.

Topic one is how the wife feels about her husband not doing what he’d

promised. Topic two is the wife’s tone and the husband’s reaction to it

(skill/how/autonomy).

A pedestrian pounds on our car as we sit at a red light. He shouts:

“You’re in the crosswalk!” We honk and shout: “Don’t you dare

pound on my car!”

Topic one is the pedestrian’s feedback to us that we shouldn’t be in the

crosswalk. Topic two is our feedback to the pedestrian that he shouldn’t

pound on our car (autonomy/skill). We will be tempted to focus only on the

pounding and not on the original feedback, but the feedback may be

legitimate. If we have a tendency to encroach on crosswalks, we may not

realize that we make it harder for people in wheelchairs or with kids to

make it comfortably across the street.

GIVE EACH TOPIC ITS OWN TRACK

Okay, you’ve spotted the two topics. Now what?

Signposting

At the point at which you realize there are two topics running

simultaneously, say that out loud and propose a way forward. Just like the

signal that directs train traffic at the switch, you’re offering a directional

sign to mark the junction where two tracks—the two topics—are splitting.

Ella is a teacher’s assistant who works with children with disabilities.

She spends extra time with the children before and after school, and uses

her evenings to design activities and collect art supplies. The teacher Ella

assists offers very little in the way of coaching or appreciation, and Ella, not

wishing to make waves, hasn’t requested any.

Eight months into the school year, the teacher speaks up: “You’re

spending too much time focused on Howard. There are nine other children

in this class.” Ella is shocked and thinks: After eight months, the first piece

of feedback I get is that I’m caring about a child too much? Have you

noticed what I mean to these kids? Have you noticed what I put into this

job? Her switchtracking is silent—her objections aren’t spoken aloud—but

her upset is likely leaking out as she quickly escapes into the hallway.

As Ella calms down, she gains some awareness and thinks: Oh, there are

two topics here. One is whether I’m spending too much time with Howard,

and the other is the one that’s triggering me right now—feeling totally

unappreciated, especially since I haven’t gotten any appreciation or

coaching all year long.

The next step is signposting. Ella goes back to the classroom and says to

the teacher: “Let’s talk about Howard and how I’m spending my time.

That’s important. This is also the first time I’ve gotten feedback. So after

we talk about Howard, I want us to come back to the question of how I get

feedback and what you notice in my work with the kids that is positive.”

The template for signposting is this: “I see two related but separate topics

for us to discuss. They are both important. Let’s discuss each topic fully but

separately, giving each topic its own track. After we’ve finished discussing

the first topic, we’ll swing back around and discuss the second one.”

Of course normal people don’t talk this way, and signposting isn’t a

natural move for most of us. It requires us to step outside the conversation

and look in on it. In fact, it’s that absence of flow that is one of the reasons

it’s so helpful. It breaks the normal reactive conversation pattern by being

hyper-explicit about what’s going on. Use your own words, but be clear.

Which topic should you discuss first? There are two factors to consider.

First, an edge should be given to the original feedback. That’s what the

other person wanted to discuss, and all things being equal, you’re better off

starting with their topic. But the second factor to take into account is

emotion. If your relationship trigger reaction is so strong that it gets in the

way of your being able to take in what they are saying, then you should say

so and propose that your topic be discussed first. This will help you hear

their topic, and at the end of the day, that’s what they care about most.

LISTEN FOR THE RELATIONSHIP ISSUES LURKING BENEATH THEIR “ADVICE”

Even when we are alert enough to resist switchtracking, we can fall into

another common trap: We stay on the giver’s topic (their track), but we

misunderstand what that topic is. This happens in part because of the often-

clumsy way givers raise their concerns. Our giver says he is giving us

“friendly advice” to help us improve, when really he is raising a deeper

relationship issue between us. We take the comment at face value and

assume we understand. But we don’t.

Remember Louie and Kim. Notice that what Kim says when she first

offers Louie coaching is essentially: “If you want to give me a gift, I don’t

like roses.” One could be forgiven for thinking the topic is gift giving. But

as things play out, it becomes clear that Kim’s topic is actually her feelings

of being unheard.

This is common. Often when we feel hurt, frustrated, ignored, offended,

or anxious, we try to keep feelings out of the picture. We use the guise of

well-intended coaching to instead offer a selection of “tips.” But we’re not

really offering coaching for the other person’s benefit. We’re hoping they

will change for our benefit.

So when you receive coaching, a question to ask yourself is this: Is this

about helping me grow and improve, or is this the giver’s way of raising an

important relationship issue that has been upsetting them?

“You might want to be more responsive”

might mean: “I’m frustrated that you don’t return my calls.”

“I think you’d be happier if you didn’t think about work night and

day”

might mean: “You’re so preoccupied with work that it’s lonely for me.”

“If you delegate some of your workload to me you’ll have more time

for the important things”

might mean: “I want you to trust me with more responsibility.”

“You’re drinking too much. It’s not good for you”

might mean: “I’m worried about your drinking, and it’s getting in the way

of our relationship.”

Why does it matter if I misunderstand their topic? Sometimes it doesn’t.

If I drink less, it will be good for me, as well as a relief for them. But if I

take their coaching simply as a suggestion for me, I may reasonably

disagree about what makes me happy. I may say, “Actually, when I work

less, I get restless.” Case closed, let’s move on. But if their concern is that

they feel lonely, I’ve missed the real topic altogether.

This is not to say that every piece of coaching you get is really hurt

feelings in a coaching disguise. Don’t simply assume there is always

something deeper going on. Instead, check: Are we on the same track?

What is the real topic here?

In fact, sometimes even the giver doesn’t realize that their coaching

comes primarily from their own anxiety or frustration. Your mother asks,

“Why aren’t you married yet? I don’t think you’re really making an effort to

meet people.” Your mother is giving you (unwanted) coaching, yes. And the

temptation will be to:

(a) Argue with her assessment (“That’s not true, I am making an effort”);

(b) Switchtrack in reaction to not feeling accepted (“I’m perfectly happy

being single. Why are you always trying to change me?”); or

old. I can run my own life!” To which she will respond: “Apparently

not”).

Listen to your own autonomy and acceptance triggers. But also listen for

the fears and concerns underlying your mother’s advice, which may be at

the heart of what’s going on for her. Instead of arguing with her dating

advice, ask: “What are you worried about?” You might learn any of the

following:

I’m worried you don’t understand that it will get harder as you get

older.

I’m worried you’ll end up with someone you don’t like (like I did).

I’m worried you’ll end up with someone I don’t like.

I’m worried you won’t be able to support yourself.

I wonder whether you ever take my advice (you don’t seem to).

I wonder whether I did something “wrong” to make it turn out this

way for you.

I can’t relax until you’re married.

Notice that none of these worries is really about dating strategies, the initial

subject of her “coaching.” Understanding her concerns will also help ease

your own relationship triggers—this is less about accepting who you are,

and more about her worries about who she is, and her worries for you. After

understanding this, you can make a good decision about whether your

initial triggers around autonomy and acceptance still feel important to

discuss.

LOUIE AND KIM: TAKE TWO

Once you are aware of relationship triggers and switchtrack conversations,

you will see them everywhere. Like a mouse in a maze, you’ll start noticing

just how many places feedback conversations can split into two and

sometimes three topics at once.

Let’s consider how the conversation would go if instead of

switchtracking, Louie responded more effectively. He might say something

like, “I was hoping the flowers would make you happy, but I can tell that

you’re upset. Help me understand why.” This would be an example of

Louie’s staying on Kim’s track (her feedback to him) to better understand it

first. Or he might signpost by saying: “Okay, I forgot you don’t like roses.

You should remind me again why. And then I have to say that I’m feeling a

little underappreciated for my effort. We should talk about both.” This

would be an example of Louie’s being explicit that there are two important

topics on the table, each needing its own track.

Of course, if Louie (or Kim) had approached the conversation with more

skill, there would be no drama, yelling, or tears. That’s a problem for a TV

sitcom seeking ratings. But a good thing for you and your real relationships.

Summary: SOME KEY IDEAS

We can be triggered by who is giving us the feedback.

What we think about the giver: Are they credible? Do we trust them? Did

they deliver our feedback with good judgment and skill?

How we feel treated by the giver: Do we feel accepted? Appreciated?

Like our autonomy is respected?

Relationship triggers create switchtrack conversations, where we have two topics on the

table and talk past each other.

Spot the two topics and give each its own track.

Surprise players in the feedback game:

Strangers

People we find difficult

People we find difficult see us at our worst and may be especially well placed to be honest

mirrors about areas where we have the most room to grow.

Listen for relationship issues lurking beneath coaching.

IDENTIFY THE RELATIONSHIP SYSTEM

Take Three Steps Back

You’re sitting at breakfast with your wife, who is sleep-deprived and

agitated. She’s got some feedback for you: Do something about the snoring.

Don’t try to pin this on the dog. It’s not the TV or the neighbors. “It’s very

simple,” she says. “You snore. I can’t sleep. You’ve got a problem. Fix it.”

You wouldn’t dream of blaming the dog. That’s ridiculous. The real

problem here is your wife. She tells the story this way: “You snore. The

End.” But you know better. Yes, you do snore. But very quietly—so quietly

that it should really have its own word. Normal people are not bothered by

your snoring. Your first wife never noticed it. The problem is that your

current wife is hypersensitive to noise, and particularly when she is feeling

stressed and anxious. With teenagers in the house, who isn’t stressed and

anxious? Yet she refuses to listen to your ideas for how to relax, and she

won’t use the white noise machine you bought her.

The problem is that your wife is too sensitive and stubborn. The End.

WHO IS THE PROBLEM AND WHO NEEDS TO CHANGE?

Feedback is often prompted by a problem: Something isn’t working.

Something isn’t right. Your wife isn’t getting enough sleep. Your boss

claims you’re not pulling your weight on the team. Your relationship with

the customer is strained. The new guy is turning out to be a more irritating

coworker than you’d planned on. Not surprisingly, feedback follows, in one

direction or another.

Nothing wrong with that. When something goes wrong, we need to be

able to talk about it so that we can figure it out and fix it.

But here’s where things get strange. When we are the ones giving the

feedback, we know we are offering “constructive criticism” and helpful

coaching. We’re confident that we’ve correctly identified the cause of the

problem, and we’re stepping up to address it.

Yet when we’re on the receiving end of this kind of feedback, we don’t

hear it as “constructive” anything. We hear it as blame: This is your fault.

You are the problem. You need to change. And that feels incredibly unfair,

because we are not the problem, it is not our fault, at least not only our

fault: If you’d stop being so stubborn and use that white noise machine

there wouldn’t be a problem.

Even for the most thoughtful among us, it’s not easy to put our finger on

exactly why these perspectives feel so different. It has to be more than just a

matter of which side of the feedback conversation we’re on, doesn’t it?

It does. But to see why, we need to understand relationship systems.

SEE THE RELATIONSHIP SYSTEM

A “system” is a set of interacting or interdependent components that forms

a complex whole. Each part in the system influences other parts in the

system; changing one thing has a ripple effect elsewhere. A relationship is a

system, a team is a system, and an organization is a system. The food chain

is an example of part of the ecosystem; the way you and your daughter

communicate almost exclusively via text messaging is part of your current

parent-teenager system.

When something goes wrong in a system, we each see some things the

other doesn’t, and these observations are not randomly distributed between

us. When something goes wrong, I tend to see the things that you did that

led to it, and you tend to see the things I did. You know that I’m snoring,

and I know that you’re sensitive. You know that I missed the deadline, and I

know that you always give me false deadlines (apparently until now).

So you’re blaming me in good faith, and I’m indignant and turn around

and blame you in good faith. We each see, genuinely, what the other is

contributing to the trouble, and we each believe we shouldn’t be taking all

the heat for the problem.

That’s Systems Insight Number Two: Each of us sees only part of the

problem (the part the other person is contributing). Systems Insight Number

One is this: Each of us is part of the problem. Maybe not to the same extent,

but we’re both involved, each affecting the other. If you didn’t snore—or

whatever you want to call it—your wife might be able to sleep. If your wife

were less stressed—or less stubborn—she might be able to sleep. It takes

the two of you being the way you are to create the problem. That’s how

systems work.

A systems view helps us understand what’s producing the frustration or

difficulties or mistakes (and hence prompting the feedback) in the first

place. It helps us identify root causes and the ways everyone in the system

is contributing to the problem. And it explains the contradictory reactions

we have as givers and receivers. Receivers react defensively because they

see clearly the giver’s contribution to the problem, and givers are surprised

by the receiver’s defensiveness because the receiver’s contribution is

obvious to them. And it often appears to each of us that the problem could

be best and most easily solved if the other person changed.

If we’re going to have better conversations about feedback, we need a

better handle on the ways that giver and receiver (and often others) are

contributing to the problem under discussion. This helps us move beyond

blame and defensiveness and toward understanding, and it also produces

more durable solutions. Often when we look at a relationship system, we

discover simple things each of us can change that will have a big impact on

the whole. And that might help everyone get some sleep.

TAKE THREE STEPS BACK

Let’s look at systems from three different vantage points—from close in,

medium range, and wide angle. Each view enables us to see different

patterns and dynamics in our relationship systems.

One Step Back: You + Me Intersections. From here we see the interaction

of you and me as a pair. What is the particular you + me combination

that is creating a problem, and what is each of us contributing to that?

Two Steps Back: Role Clashes. This view expands our perspective to

look at the roles each of us plays on the team, in the organization, or in

the family. Roles are often a crucial but largely invisible reason we

bump into each other.

Three Steps Back: The Big Picture. From this frame of reference we can

view the entire landscape—including other players, structures, and

processes that guide and constrain the choices we each make and the

outcomes we get.

ONE STEP BACK: YOU + ME INTERSECTIONS

Feedback is often expressed as “This is how you are, and that’s the

problem.” But in relationships, “This is how you are” really means “This is

how you are in relationship to how I am.” It’s the combination—the

intersection of our differences—that is often causing the problem.

Your need for downtime on weekends is only a problem in relationship

to my need for your attention and engagement. Your desire to empty Mom’s

house right after the funeral is only a problem in relationship to my desire

to have time to mourn. It is not a problem that you speak only Swedish and

it is not a problem that I speak only English. But together we’re in trouble.

These differences often become dynamic systems, creating downward

spirals of action and reaction. Sandy and Gil have a flash point around

money. Sandy thinks Gil is a cheapskate; Gil thinks Sandy is a spendthrift.

When Sandy and Gil were first married, their differences caused only minor

squabbles. The situation darkened when Gil was laid off, and they

discovered that their ways of coping with money and stress form a perfect

mismatched set. When Sandy is worried, she finds comfort in habit and

small luxuries. She doesn’t indulge a lot these days, but that three-dollar

cappuccino feels to her like a vacation from worry. Gil soothes his anxiety

by keeping track of how much money they have down to the penny, and

finding even symbolic ways to cut back. It helps him feel in control.

Not surprisingly, the two exchange feedback. Gil berates Sandy: “I can’t

understand how you can be so wasteful at exactly the time we’re cutting

back.” And Sandy scolds Gil: “Did you really need to march back to the

supermarket to exchange my Grape-Nuts for the store-brand cereal? You’re

nuts. Is saving thirty-five cents really worth all this tension?”

Each points the finger of blame at the other, and neither sees their own

contribution to the dynamic. At any given moment, the feedback looks like

this:

But over time, there’s a downward spiral. As stress increases, Gil’s urge to

monitor increases, which causes Sandy to crave her small pleasures even

more. So she keeps her Grape-Nuts hidden in the corner cupboard, and

when Gil finds the box he confronts her. Incredulous that she has gone

behind his back, he feels even more out of control, and tries to clamp down

harder. “You’re a spendthrift” turns into “You’re selfish, untrustworthy, and

out of control.” “You’re a cheapskate” turns into “You’re controlling,

irrational, and overreacting.” And each, on the receiving end, dismisses the

other’s feedback—as just more evidence of the other’s craziness.

Neither Sandy nor Gil sees the system. From the inside, what we see is the

other person’s behavior and its impact on us. We see ourselves as merely

responding to the problem that the other person is creating.

Intersections—differences in preferences, tendencies, and traits that

cause us to bump into each other—account for a significant proportion of

the friction and feedback in both personal and professional relationships.

Marriage researcher John Gottman reports that 69 percent of the fights

married couples currently have are about the same subjects they were

arguing about five years ago.1 And chances are, they’ll be selecting from

that same menu of arguments five years from now.

Our own preferences, tendencies, and traits can sometimes be outside our

awareness: how we manage uncertainty; how we experience novelty; what

makes us feel safe; what recharges or drains our energy; how we experience

conflict; whether we are detail- or big-picture-oriented, linear or random,

volatile or stable, optimistic or pessimistic. In fact, we may not even realize

that our own tendencies are tendencies until we are in the company of

someone who is different. An American boy laughs when told by a British

girl that he has an “American accent.” Obviously, it’s the Brit who has the

accent.

We also don’t see our own system patterns, although people outside of

them can often spot their contours easily. You are exasperated with your

kids: Why do I have to ask you seven hundred times to get your shoes out of

the middle of the kitchen? Your father-in-law is visiting and offers some

(uninvited) coaching: “You need to follow through. You need to be

consistent.”

This is enough to send you over the edge—you are following through by

asking them 699 more times, after all. Previously, you had been giving up

and moving the shoes yourself.

And yet your father-in-law sees something in your relationship system

with the kids that you don’t see. He sees the progression as you ask nicely,

prod gently, admonish with threats, and finally lose it. And he can see that

your kids have learned that Mom doesn’t actually “mean it” until she yells.

So they ignore you and watch TV while they wait for you to mean it.

Taking one step back means stepping outside your own perspective to

observe the system as your father-in-law does. Instead of focusing on what

the other person is doing wrong, notice what you are each doing in reaction

to the other. As you do, you’ll begin to spot the larger patterns. Continual

pestering, which you thought was the “following through” solution, is

actually reinforcing the problem.2

TWO STEPS BACK: ROLE CLASHES AND ACCIDENTAL ADVERSARIES

The first step back looks at you and the other person, and the way your

tendencies interact and intersect. The second step back adds another layer:

This is not just about you and me, this is also about the roles we play.

Roles are defined by their relationship to other roles. You’re not an older

sibling until you have a younger sibling; you aren’t a mentor until you’ve

got someone to “ment.” Although there are personality-driven aspects to

roles—I’m the funny one, you’re the responsible one—roles have an effect

on behavior that is independent of character. A role is like an ice cube tray

into which you pour your personality. What you pour in matters, but so does

the shape of the tray. Whether I’m musical or tone-deaf, humble or a

braggart, if I am the cop and you are the speeder, things are likely to play

out between us in reasonably predictable ways.

One important role pattern is called “accidental adversaries.”3 If two

people bump into each other enough and cause each other enough

frustration, each will begin considering the other an “adversary.” Each

attributes the problem to the personality and questionable intentions of the

other. But often the true culprit is the structure of the roles they are in,

which are (accidentally) creating chronic conflict. If we are each at one end

of a rope and our job is to pull, then merely doing our jobs creates a tug-of-

war.

The cop and the speeder might have everything in common—they could

be identical twins—but in their interaction at the side of the road, their roles

may create conflict. The same is true of disgruntled customers and customer

reps, stressed teachers and anxious parents, ex-husbands and the new guy.

Accidental adversaries are created by two things: role confusion and role

clarity.

As organizations change and responsibilities shift, roles get messy

quickly. It’s no longer clear where my position ends and yours begins. Ted

asked me for new pricing information, and you jumped in and sent it to him

before I had the chance to respond. Ted asked me because I’m the pricing

guru; Ted didn’t ask you because you are not the pricing guru. Except that

when you tell the story, you are the pricing guru, and I’m the guy Ted asked

by mistake. Could we really be this confused? We could.

It’s impossible to overstate the extent to which role confusion exists,

even in the most well-run organizations. Three of us think we’re in charge

of task A, and none of us thinks we’re in charge of tasks B, C, and D.

Globalization and virtual relationships heighten the challenges, as do

reorgs, mergers, matrixed reporting lines, and every kind of employee

mobility. Yesterday we were peers; today you’re my boss’s boss. Yesterday

we shared a cubicle; today you’re Skyping me from your office in Lisbon.

The permeable boundaries among departments, functions, and business

units contribute to the muddle as well. If I oversee data mining for print

media, why do I keep getting memos from Marketing that Barry is in charge

of data mining across all media platforms, including print, and that any

other reports are considered “unauthorized”?

Sometimes role clashes arise not from confusion but from clarity. The

tension is embedded in the organizational structure itself. Compliance

officers and traders at a bank will often be in conflict, not just because of

rogue traders or overly cautious compliance officers, but because the very

nature of their roles puts them at odds. Other common examples are Sales

and Legal, surgeons and anesthesiologists, architects and engineers, and HR

and everyone. As one HR executive joked, “In HR, we’re not happy until

you’re not happy.”

Of course, everyone knows that the HR function is crucial, but busy

people can still find it intrusive. We’re quick to attribute character as the

cause: Those in HR are compulsive, uptight, and excessively rule-bound.

On the flip side, HR is frustrated by the deadbeats across all functions who

are behind on their time sheets, submit perfunctory performance reviews,

and skip out on mandatory training. Why do so many of our people behave

like flaky, petulant teenagers?

At the organizational level, these role tensions serve important purposes,

but at the interpersonal level they can be destructive, especially if people

are misidentifying the source of the conflict. It’s essential to disentangle the

individual from their role by taking two steps back and asking: How are our

roles contributing to how we see each other, and to the feedback we give

each other? How much is role, and how much is personality or

performance? Even if you don’t have an answer, just asking yourself the

question, or discussing it between you, can shift awareness.

THREE STEPS BACK: THE BIG PICTURE (OTHER PLAYERS, PROCESSES,

POLICIES, AND STRUCTURES)

The third step back enables us to take in the big picture, which includes not

only other players but also the physical environment, timing and decision

making, policies, processes, and workaround coping strategies. All of these

influence behavior and decisions, and the feedback we give one another.

They are part of the system we’re in.

Imagine that a worker is seriously injured working at a refinery, and you

are the safety rep. It’s your job to ensure that such accidents never happen

again. In searching for the cause, a common tendency is to focus only on

the behavior of the injured worker: Was he following protocol? How long

has he been in the job? Was he fatigued or drinking? What did he do

wrong?

Important questions, but you know it’s about more than just this worker.

So you take three steps back to consider the big picture, the whole safety

landscape. If the worker was fatigued, who knew that he had worked a

double shift, and how often do workers operate equipment when overtired?

Who last repaired this piece of machinery, and were there notes on the

repair? Was the supervisor aware that nonstandard parts were used? What

has been the impact of cutbacks in safety training? How does the

performance evaluation system incent, or fail to incent, safe behavior? How

have changes to the work-rest rules influenced fatigue or information

exchange at shift changes?

Three Steps Back: The Big Picture

OTHER PLAYERS

Two senior leaders clash, and team members

beneath them are buffeted by conflicting

instructions. Innovation and risk taking are

inhibited, an us-them attitude takes hold, and an

inordinate amount of time is spent trying to manage

and “work around” the conflict.

Conflicts between two people can profoundly

affect the work patterns and relationships of

others around them. Understanding what’s

going on often necessitates looking at the

broader team, department, or cross-functional

dynamics.

PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT

The new elevator system is state-of-the-art, but the The physical environment can affect how we

dedication to small clusters of floors means you

only see people you already work with. You haven’t

done more than exchange e-mail with the folks

downstairs in months.

work together. Open office space can

encourage collaboration or chill candid

discussion. Functions that need to work well

together can end up in different buildings or

different hemispheres.

TIMING AND DECISION MAKING

Francie has to put in for vacation time six months

ahead; her brother Finn receives his work schedule

only two weeks in advance. Francie doesn’t

understand why her kid brother can’t get his act

together to commit to the family vacation schedule,

even as an adult.

Differences in structure and timing of

decision making can create problems between

individuals or groups. Some may need to

consult widely and get buy-in from others,

while others can make decisions

independently.

POLICIES AND PROCESSES

Centralizing marketing in London has created a

unified product marketing approach, yet Cambodia

says the new campaign won’t work on the ground.

Centralizing processes creates efficiencies but

makes it more difficult to respond to local

needs.

COPING STRATEGIES

Research is consistently late reporting their

department numbers to Accounting. Accounting

begins to give false deadlines. Research soon

catches on, and now they take Accounting’s

deadlines even less seriously.

Players develop coping strategies for working

with others that they find challenging. The

effects will show up in the second and third

rounds—so-called lag effects.

There’s a balance to be struck. We don’t want to waste time on a fishing

expedition, and it’s tempting to quit looking once we have one compelling

explanation in hand. But we shouldn’t overlook significant inputs and root

causes simply because they are not proximate to the injury in time or place.4

The chart offers some big-picture factors worth watching for.

FEEDBACK THROUGH A SYSTEMS LENS

Let’s step into a second-grade classroom and look at how a systems lens can

help us with feedback and communication.

The second-grade teacher speaks carefully: “Your daughter Kenzie is a

strong personality. She says things that upset other children.” The teacher

sees Kenzie as a good kid, but a bit of a bully. He is hoping that Kenzie’s

mom is able to take the feedback to heart.

Alas, Kenzie is eavesdropping outside the door and bursts in to protest:

“Mom! Those kids are so annoying! They’re the ones who start it! And I

can’t help it if they’re crybabies!” From Kenzie’s point of view, she is not

the problem. She is the victim.

The feedback conversation grinds to a halt. Kenzie feels unfairly

accused, the teacher is exasperated at Kenzie’s unwillingness to take

responsibility, and Kenzie’s mom is unsure whom to believe. Let’s see how

we might be able to better understand the teacher’s feedback about Kenzie

by looking at what’s going on from each of our three vantage points.

The first step back looks at individual intersections, and we see this: One

difference between Kenzie and some of her classmates is simply inborn.

Kenzie is a bit of a drama queen. Everything is either “amazingly fabulous”

or “horribly catastrophic.” She’s a big personality, and among the eight-

year-old set, a flair for the dramatic wins Kenzie attention.

The second step back looks at roles. Kenzie was the new kid in school

last year, increasing the urgency she felt to find her niche, and also adding a

touch of mystery to her persona. Her “way in” was to entertain, and kids

gravitated to her, eager to hear her rendition of the teacher’s “oops” moment

in math or her reenactment of the “humiliation” aboard the morning bus.

This encouraged Kenzie to tell even bigger and more exaggerated stories,

and it was soon clear to everyone that she had taken on the role of class

entertainer. Now we’re starting to see the system in motion—Kenzie’s

behavior influences her classmates’ behavior, which in turn influences her.

In contrast to Kenzie, some kids don’t like being the center of attention.

When one accidentally spills paint on Kenzie’s poster in art class, Kenzie

yells, “You are the most horrible person ever!” It’s hard for Kenzie to

understand how upsetting her oversized reaction is to a sensitive child,

because it wouldn’t be so upsetting for her. Other kids are more sympathetic

to the accidental paint spiller. They talk among themselves about Kenzie

being “mean,” and begin to steer clear of her.

So far we have looked at intersections and roles. Let’s take a third step

back for a broader look at what happens next. The friends who stick with

Kenzie are quick to tell her what so-and-so said, or who says they will

never play with Kenzie again. They don’t exactly mean to wind Kenzie up,

but her reaction is so swift and dramatic that it only makes the friendship

that much more exciting. We are on the inside, where the cool people are;

the others are losers and crybabies. Meanwhile, those who empathize with

the quieter kids are thinking this: We have our own group, where the nice

kids are; the others are the bad kids and bullies. From an initial focus on

Kenzie, we can pull back and see that there are cliques forming, and that the

cliques themselves interact and contribute to the system.

Another factor in the broader system is the physical layout of the

playground, which inadvertently reinforces the us-them dynamic. With part

of the school under construction, the playground is left with only two four-

square courts, where the girls often divide into opposing camps. School

policies contribute as well: Whenever there is trouble, the offending student

is sent to the principal’s office, but there is no process for a reconciliation

conversation among students to help them understand and repair

relationships. Discipline is based on identifying and removing a single

actor, and the larger system is left unaddressed.

Seeing Feedback in the System

One Step Back: In what ways does the feedback reflect differences in preferences,

assumptions, styles, or implicit rules between us?

Two Steps Back: Do our roles make it more or less likely that we might bump into each

other?

Three Steps Back: What other players influence our behavior and choices? Are physical

setups, processes, or structures also contributing to the problem?

Circling Back to Me: What am I doing (or failing to do) that is contributing to the dynamic

between us?

From the teacher’s perspective at the front of the classroom, the

commotion centers on Kenzie. And so Kenzie’s parents are called in for

some feedback on how their daughter needs to change. If they take the

feedback at face value and sit Kenzie down to explain that she needs to be

“nicer and less harsh,” Kenzie will no doubt bristle in protest. Not because

she’s trying to get away with something, but because the real problem, from

where she sits, isn’t only her. Her classmates are crybabies, and also,

apparently, tattletales (tune in tomorrow morning for Kenzie’s lively

reporting on the injustice perpetrated at the mom-teacher meeting).

Certainly, Kenzie needs to understand the impact of her behavior on

other kids, and there are things she does need to change. But she’s not

wrong that there are other people and factors contributing to the problem. If

the teacher and Kenzie’s mom (and even Kenzie herself) are able to discuss

the larger system, Kenzie will feel more fairly treated and may become

more receptive to coaching. And just as important, they may uncover new

strategies for addressing the dynamic. For example, it might be useful for a

number of students from the different cliques to sit down and talk about the

situation. The us-them dynamic could be broken up by pairing kids across

these divides to work on projects together. Or roles might be shuffled.

Kenzie could be assigned the role of making sure the quieter kids are

included in certain activities. And Kenzie’s parents might notice that some

of what she’s been saying are things she’s heard at home, where they often

jokingly take things to an extreme: “You’re the worst!” or “You’re the

best!” Hmm.

THE BENEFITS OF A SYSTEMS LENS

There are a number of advantages to understanding feedback through a

systems lens.

IT’S MORE ACCURATE

The first benefit is simple: It’s reality. Systems thinking corrects for the

skew of any single perspective. If I tend to see what you are contributing to

the problem, and you tend to see what I’m contributing, we can add our two

perspectives together to get a better sense of the whole. As we start to see

how each of us is affecting the other, opposing arrows of causality are

revealed to be circles and cycles.

IT MOVES US AWAY FROM NEEDLESS JUDGMENT

A second benefit is that systems thinking eases the temptation to treat other

people’s contributions to the problem as automatically “bad” or “wrong” or

“blameworthy.” We are the exact normal amount of neurotic or detail

oriented or risk taking. Others are overly neurotic or careless or too

conservative. If we’re not careful, “that thing the guys at Corporate do”

morphs into “those selfish #$%s over in Corporate.” The first is a

description of an action; the second is a blanket judgment of the people. We

are less likely to make that leap from description to damnation if we see the

conflict as a simple intersection, perhaps compounded by clashing roles,

inside a larger system. We are more risk tolerant than they are, and that

makes investment decisions between us tough. It’s harder to demonize the

“other” when we are clear-eyed about our part of the problem and the ways

our interlocking actions and preferences form a cycle. That’s you and your

wife, the snoring and the sensitivity. Neither is “bad.” Together they are

problematic for both of you.

IT ENHANCES ACCOUNTABILITY

Fine, you say, but what about the times the other person’s behavior really is

blameworthy? Your uncle should not have hocked Grandma’s silver, your

neighbor’s son should not have blown up your mailbox, and the woman in

the next cubicle should not have fabricated those time sheets. Is a so-called

systems approach just a way to dilute or avoid responsibility by shifting the

focus from the individual to the system?

We think it’s the opposite. You can’t take meaningful responsibility for

causing a problem until you understand the combination of factors that

actually caused the problem. A systems approach helps you clarify your

choices and actions, and how they created the outcomes you got. Then

when you say you are accountable, it actually means something.

Of course, a systems approach doesn’t automatically increase

accountability. When a manager says, “One of my new recruits fabricated

time sheets, and we should really have more training and oversight,” it is a

“systems” statement. But it’s only a start. It’s not clear yet whether the

manager is taking any responsibility for what happened, or what he thinks

he—or anyone else—is accountable for.

Meaningful accountability requires the manager to take a more detailed

look at why the employee made the choices she did, and at the role the

manager might have played in that, as well as at the other players, tracking

systems, and training that might have contributed to the time sheet

transgression. For instance, who explained to the recruit how to think about

time spent on various projects, how to account for breaks or travel time?

And is there anything the manager did to put pressure on the recruit to log

extra hours, or did he informally or even unwittingly encourage a culture of

“hard work macho” that set a norm of inflating hours spent?

Understanding that a problem has multiple causes doesn’t limit our

options for how we move forward to solve that problem. Discipline or

punishment may be appropriate, as in cases where actions are illegal,

unethical, inappropriate, or otherwise violate policy. Sometimes managers

will say, “How can I discipline the employee when I myself contributed to

the problem?” That’s like saying, “How can we punish a bank robber when

we at the bank contributed to the problem by having a faulty security

system in place?” Well, it’s not good to have a faulty security system in

place, and if you have one, it’s good to know about it. But the fact that your

security system is faulty has nothing to do with whether the robber should

go to jail.

Of course, understanding the system may change how you see the

problem, and therefore what you think is the best way to address it. If the

employee wasn’t aware of a policy because you didn’t tell them about it,

perhaps you correct the ignorance and issue a warning. That’s different

from an employee who knowingly flouts the policy. A systems approach

helps you get a sense of appropriate action going forward.

IT HELPS CORRECT OUR TENDENCY TO SHIFT OR ABSORB

There are two common feedback profiles that are particularly challenging to

deal with on the topic of accountability: shifters and absorbers. A systems

perspective helps us fight these tendencies in ourselves and understand

them in others as we talk about feedback.

Blame Absorbers: It’s All Me

The first common feedback profile is the blame absorber. When things go

wrong, you point the finger at yourself, now and forever. You cheated on

me? I must not be attractive enough. Our product didn’t sell to

expectations? I screwed up the launch. It’s raining out? Must be something I

said.

In addition to the emotional swamp created by believing everything is

your fault, there are learning drawbacks as well. Carrying all the weight of

fixing relationships and projects by yourself may feel noble, but it obstructs

learning just as surely as rejecting responsibility altogether. Absorbers will

tend to see their own contribution to the problem and stop there. They

quickly accept feedback and cut the conversation short, failing to explore

the intersections, roles, choices, and reactions that created the problem

under discussion.

That launch you screwed up? You flatter yourself when you think you

could have sunk the effort single-handedly. Chances are there were multiple

reasons for the disappointing performance, from concept to time lines to

production to marketing to distribution. If you want the next product rollout

to go better, you can’t expect to fix all these things alone. If you soak up all

the responsibility, you let others off the hook. Responsibility for learning

and fixing the problem is hoarded and the best solutions less likely to

emerge.

Another challenge for absorbers is that resentment can build over time.

Deeper down we know realistically that it’s not all us, yet others don’t seem

to be taking their fair share of responsibility. Absorbers also start to bump

up against what they can change on their own—when others aren’t willing

to look at their part of the problem, there’s only so much one person can do

to affect the system.

It’s also worth noting here that absorbers can be prone to remaining in

situations of abuse. In an emotionally or physically abusive relationship, the

person doing the yelling, denigrating, or lashing out is able to distract

attention from their own hurtful behavior by pointing to what the victim did

to provoke it. The person giving the feedback (“You shouldn’t provoke

me”) might be accurately describing the victim’s part in the system. What

they leave out, of course, is their own behavior, which is hurtful, harmful,

and unfair. This is one reason that such relationships are so lonely, and why

it is so tough to navigate your way out of an abusive relationship system.

The feedback givers claim that the things you see and feel aren’t even there.

Blame Shifters: It’s Not Me

The other feedback profile includes people who are chronically immune to

acknowledging their role in problems. When they get feedback or suffer

failure, they are quick to point to everyone who hindered their efforts or

must be biased against them: It was the finance folks, the new IT system,

the neighbors, that squirrel over there.

You might think this stance would be relaxing; after all, feedback simply

bounces off you and nothing is ever your fault. But the experience is

ultimately exhausting. Shifters find themselves constantly assaulted by

everyone else’s incompetence or treacherousness. They are victims,

powerless to protect themselves. Life happens to them. In fact, life happens

at them.

If my investor pitch didn’t get funded, it must be because the venture

capitalists are fools, the markets are impossible right now, or I’m a genius

ahead of my time. Because I can’t control any of these factors, I feel

victimized, angry, helpless, or depressed. In this frame of mind, there is

nothing I could have done to change the outcome, because the causes are all

external to me. Or so things seem.

A victim stance makes it impossible for feedback to penetrate; I can’t

learn anything that might help my next pitch. Was my market analysis

incomplete? Was I unprepared for questions about competitive products?

Did I ignore early feedback from focus groups that perhaps I should have

heeded? Seeing my own contribution to my circumstances makes me

stronger, not weaker. If I contribute to my own problems, there are things I

have the power to change.

IT HELPS US AVOID “FIXES THAT FAIL”

When we don’t understand the system that produces the feedback, we often

make the mistake of trying to adjust just one component of the system, and

expect that to solve the whole problem. But firing the CEO is on its own

unlikely to change the entire corporate culture, so the problem persists.

Even worse is the fix that actually creates new and unexpected additional

issues.

Alice is frustrated. Her direct report, Benny, is consistently late and over

budget on project delivery, and it’s causing friction with their boss, Vince.

So Alice gives Benny some feedback: “You’ve got to find a way to bring

these projects in on time and on budget.” Alice is clear: Benny needs to

change. Benny gets the message.

What’s not explored is why Benny is late, and what Alice, Vince, and the

board may be doing to contribute to that. Instead the feedback assumes that

this is a Benny Problem; it also (implicitly) assumes that Benny has the

ability to fix it on his own. But Benny can’t remedy it by himself, because

part of the difficulty is that the board keeps changing its mind about what it

wants, Vince fails to convey that message in a timely fashion, and Alice

rarely passes on a clear or complete description of the new parameters.

Also, when Benny warns Alice that these changes will cause delays and

cost more money, Alice doesn’t always get that message back to Vince and

the board.

Because no one is asking the systems question, Benny does what Benny

can do under the circumstances: He starts giving the board budgets that are

twice as high and timelines that are twice as long as he did previously. Now

he comes in under (new) budget and on (new) time.

Is this a fix? In fact, if Benny’s new budgets and new timelines are more

realistic, and if the concern is predictability rather than cost and timeliness,

then the fix succeeds, at least in the short term.

But the story doesn’t stop here, because the longer timelines and bigger

budgets start to have a lag effect on the players in the system. The board

now has twice as much time to change its mind, request added functionality,

and look over Benny’s shoulder at the results. And the larger budgets raise

expectations about what Benny can provide. Soon he is working twice as

hard, juggling more complex requests, and under even more pressure from

Alice and Vince.

When feedback is aimed at just one piece of the larger system, and

doesn’t look at the other contributing factors, we get the Benny Bad

Outcome. How do we get ourselves caught up in fixes that fail? By

focusing on only one player in the system and papering over the real

problem with a solution that is fundamentally unsound. Solutions like

Benny’s may seem like good ideas at the time. We’re often tempted to solve

a short-term problem without taking account of the long-term cost.5

TALKING ABOUT SYSTEMS

Exploring systems skillfully starts with the awareness that what you’re

facing may indeed be a systems problem.

BE ON THE LOOKOUT

Pay attention to your own silent switchtracking reaction to others’

feedback: I’m not the problem! or I could get you better numbers if you

didn’t wait until the last minute to ask for them or I’m only crabby because

you’re always late. These knee-jerk “not my fault!” thoughts are clues that

stepping back to understand the interaction behind the feedback will be

helpful.

TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR PART

The next step is to be accountable: Figure out your contribution to the

problem and take responsibility for it. Otherwise the giver will hear your

suggestion to look at “our relationship system” as making excuses. They’ll

assume you’re attempting to deflect the feedback and point a finger back at

them. They won’t be interested in your fancy ideas about “systems.” In fact,

avoid phrases like “relationship system” altogether.

In these conversations, there are two big messages you are trying to send:

First, I take responsibility for my part, and second, we are both contributing

to this. It is sometimes hard to send both of those messages in the same

conversation. They are consistent and logical, but to the person giving you

feedback, they can sound contradictory. So think about whether the giver

will be able to hear both messages in one conversation, and if not, start by

taking responsibility, and once that’s settled in, circle back and talk about

your observations about the system and your requests of them.

“HERE’S WHAT WOULD HELP ME CHANGE”

A feedback giver may not be ready or able to acknowledge their

contribution to the problem. They may still be stuck in thinking this

feedback party is all about you.

If that’s the case, there’s still something you can do. Rather than trying to

force them to admit to and take responsibility for their part in the problem,

describe how they could get a better reaction from you. You’re asking them

to change, but you’re casting it (legitimately) in service of helping you

change.

Gil can tell Sandy: “I have the strongest reaction to being surprised,

because it makes me panic about where else you might be spending and not

telling me. I know I’m overreacting sometimes and I’m working on that. It

would help me if you would be willing to be upfront with me about the

Grape-Nuts and the mochaccino ‘mini-vacations,’ and we can budget for

them together.”

LOOK FOR THEMES: IS THIS A ME + EVERYBODY INTERSECTION?

Sometimes the feedback you get is the very direct product of your particular

intersection with this particular person. You sort of mumble and they are

hard of hearing.

But at other times a disturbing consistency surfaces—no matter who you

are in a relationship with, they have the same feedback for you. Your

temper is trying. You rarely call anyone back. You are disorganized,

forgetful, or scattered. Richard’s first girlfriend complained that he was

emotionally distant. Richard chalked it up to his girlfriend’s idiosyncratic

brand of neediness. But when Richard’s next two girlfriends said the same

thing, he started paying attention (a little).

When you first realize that this Me + You intersection is in fact a Me +

Everybody intersection, you might feel a bit disheartened. But there’s good

news here, too. Me + Everybody systems can actually be fairly simple to

change, because when one of you changes (i.e., you), the whole system

improves. And in this case, multiple systems will improve. It’s a rare life

circumstance where so much is within your control.

USE THE SYSTEM TO SUPPORT CHANGE (NOT THWART IT)

Sometimes feedback is simple: Shine your shoes before inspection. Don’t

interrupt. Call your mother more often. These are all behaviors you can

change reasonably easily and to predictably good effect.

At other times change is more complicated. We may both agree that

things would be easier if you were less moody, but another lecture isn’t

going to help.

What’s interesting is that, once we identify the contours of a system, we

can often make useful changes that don’t require that people change their

personalities. We can shift their roles, change the processes we use, or even

change the environment. Would putting Sandy in charge of the budget

change her emotional experience of spending even three dollars? Would

including me in the meeting with the client to discuss my analysis guarantee

I would have it done on time? Would swapping household chores so that

yours are finished in the morning mean that you are more relaxed and less

moody over dinner at night? It’s possible. And that’s what seeing systems

does: It creates possibilities.

Summary: SOME KEY IDEAS

To understand the feedback you get, take three steps back:

One Step Back: You + Me intersections. Are differences between us

creating the friction?

Two Steps Back: Role clashes. Is this partly a result of the roles we play

in the organization or the family?

Three Steps Back: Big picture. Are processes, policies, physical

environment, or other players reinforcing the problem?

Looking at systems:

Reduces judgment

Enhances accountability

Uncovers root causes

Look for patterns in your feedback. Is this a You + Everybody intersection?

Take responsibility for your part.

IDENTITY TRIGGERS

and the challenge of being

Identity Triggers (and the challenge of being ME)

At some level we are always scanning for danger. In the next three chapters we find it.

Feedback can be threatening because it prompts questions about the most challenging

relationship you have: your relationship with yourself. Are you a good person? Do you

deserve your own respect? Can you live with yourself? Forgive yourself?

Interestingly, not everyone reacts to feedback and identity threats in the same way and to

the same degree, or takes the same amount of time to recover. In chapter 7, we take a

quick peek inside the brain to explore why that is. Your particular wiring—how sensitive or

insensitive you are, how quickly you bounce back—influences how you experience both

positive and negative feedback. Understanding your wiring will help you to understand your

own emotional reactions when receiving feedback.

That’s critical, because our feelings influence our thoughts, and the story we tell ourselves

about what the feedback means can become distorted. Chapter 8 looks at five ways to

dismantle these distortions so that you can see the feedback more clearly, at “actual size.”

Once you see the feedback clearly, the next task is to figure out how to square the feedback

with your identity—your self-story about who you are in the world. Where chapter 8

examines how we make sense of, and distort, the feedback, chapter 9 examines how we

make sense of, and distort, our self-image. Our identity can be more and less sturdy, more

and less conducive to learning. In chapter 9, we’ll give you three practices to help you move

from a vulnerable fixed identity to a robust growth identity, which will make it easier for you

to learn from feedback and experience.

LEARN HOW WIRING AND TEMPERAMENT

AFFECT YOUR STORY

Krista doesn’t lack self-confidence. She laughs as she recounts this story:

My husband and I spent the first six months of our marriage traveling

the States by car, with “Honk if you support our marriage!” scribbled

in shoe polish on the rear window. People honked and waved like

crazy, and it was exhilarating to be supported by friendly strangers.

When we returned to regular life, my husband cleaned off the window,

but I didn’t notice. So, I’d be doing some dumb move in traffic, pulling

a U-turn. Someone would be honking furiously, and I’d be waving

back with this big grin, saying, “Hey, thanks so much. Thank you! I

love you, too!”

“That’s typical for me,” Krista adds. “I can be oblivious to negative

feedback. When I hear that someone doesn’t like something I did, I

immediately think, Really? But do you know how amazing I am? Honestly,

I’ve got so much self-confidence it’s practically inappropriate.”

Of course Krista’s life has seen its share of rain, and she wasn’t smiling

through it all. But even at her lowest, her upbeat disposition helped to pull

her through: “My first husband and I divorced, and a divorce is a giant

oozing spitball of negative feedback. I questioned everything about myself

—whether anyone could love me, whether I was capable of real love at all.

I went to some dark places, like everyone does.

“But,” she adds, “I didn’t stay very long. I can get from ‘no one will ever

love me’ to ‘that’s ridiculous, lots of people love me’ pretty quickly. Within

a year I was in an awesome relationship with my current husband, driving

around the country getting honks of loving support.”

Alita finds herself at the opposite end of the spectrum. A popular

obstetrician, Alita received feedback from last year’s patient survey. Her

reviews were glowing, and many patients made special mention of her

attentive approach to their pregnancy questions. But several patients

commented that Alita’s schedule often ran late, and that they resented

having to wait. The comments came down like a sledgehammer. “I was so

disheartened,” Alita says. “I give each patient so much time and care, and

then they turn around and complain. Until I read my feedback I loved my

job. I haven’t felt the same about my practice since.” The envelope with the

most recent patient survey results has been sitting on Alita’s desk for the

past two months—unopened.

For Krista, feedback is like water off a duck’s back, while for Alita, it

penetrates deep into her soul. We each metabolize feedback in our own way.

THE LIBERATION OF HARD WIRING

One reason why Krista and Alita respond so differently to feedback is their

wiring—their built-in neural structures and connections. Our wiring affects

who we are, tilting us toward being anxious or upbeat, shy or outgoing,

sensitive or resilient, and it contributes to how intensely feedback—both

positive and negative—affects us. It influences how high we go, how low

we descend, and how quickly we recover from dread or despair.

This chapter takes a look at our different emotional reactions to feedback

and at the role our wiring plays in that. We’ll also look at how those

emotions influence our thinking, and how our thinking influences our

emotions. Understanding your own wiring and tendencies helps you to

improve your ability to weather the storm of negative feedback—and to dig

yourself out in the morning.

Learning that how you are in the world is due in part to your wiring

might feel discouraging—just one more thing that’s wrong with you, and

one that seems impossible to fix. But it can be freeing, as well. Like your

naturally curly hair, high cheekbones, or flat feet, your wiring is no more

judgment-worthy than whether your second toe is shorter or longer than the

first. If you’ve spent a lifetime being told that you’re either

“hypersensitive” or “totally oblivious,” this is a moment to step back and

say, “Okay, so that’s how I’m built. That’s how I showed up in this world.”

Your reactions are not due to a lack of courage or surplus of self-pity.

This doesn’t absolve you of responsibility for how you are and how you

act. It is simply a true and usefully complicating observation: wiring

matters.1

A BEHIND-THE-SCENES LOOK AT YOURSELF ON FEEDBACK

Our understanding of the brain is under construction. By “our” we mean the

general state of human understanding (not to mention the authors’

understanding). Discoveries in neuroscience pour forth, debates proliferate,

interpretations shift. Writing about neuroscience is a little like leaping from

a moving train: No matter how carefully you time your jump, you’re likely

to get roughed up. Even so, we think it’s useful; dipping into the recent

social science and neuroscience research can help us understand why we

each react to feedback the way we do, and why others react differently.

One of the brain’s primary survival functions is to manage approach and

withdrawal: We tend to move toward things that are pleasurable and away

from things that are painful. Pleasure is a rough proxy for the healthy and

safe; pain is a rough proxy for the unhealthy and dangerous.

But our approach-withdrawal function is too crudely calibrated to

navigate the nuanced worlds of modern work and love. The brain gets

tangled when it encounters short-term pain that is necessary for long-term

gain—that exercising you put off, for instance. And the opposite is also

true: Short-term pleasures that produce long-term pain—as with, say,

recreational drugs or an extramarital affair—also produce confused

approach-withdraw signals (“wine, women, and song” in older days; “sex,

drugs, and rock ’n’ roll” to baby boomers). These brain-life mismatches are

the source of great fascination and endless torment.

What does this have to do with feedback? Like sex, drugs, food, and

exercise, feedback is one of these areas that boggle the brain and muck up

the approach-withdrawal system. Doing what feels good now (finding a

way to make negative feedback stop) may be costly in the long run (you are

left, fired, or simply stagnate). And what is healthy in the long run

(understanding and acting on useful feedback) may feel painful now.

A lot goes on in both your brain and body when you experience mood-

altering feedback, more than anyone yet understands, and certainly more

than we can describe in a short chapter. But for simplicity’s sake, we can

say that your “reaction” to feedback can be thought of as containing three

key variables: Baseline, Swing, and Sustain or Recovery.

“Baseline” refers to the default state of well-being or contentment toward

which you gravitate in the wake of good or bad events in your life. “Swing”

refers to how far up or down you move from your baseline when you

receive feedback. Some of us have extreme reactions to feedback; we swing

wide. Others remain on an even keel even in the face of disquieting news.

“Sustain and Recovery” refers to duration, how long your ups and downs

last. Ideally, we want to sustain a boost from positive feedback and recover

quickly from a negative emotional dip.

1. Baseline: The Beginning and End of the Arc

Whether we feel happy or sad, content or discontent, is not determined

merely by each individual successive moment of life experience—a good

thing happens and I’m happy, a bad thing happens and I’m sad. It doesn’t

work that way. While our experiences affect our mood, we are not blown in

a completely new direction by each gust of wind. We feel emotions in the

moment, of course, but they occur against a broader backdrop.

As humans, we adapt—to new information and events both good and bad

—and gravitate back to our personal default level of well-being.2 There will

be highs and lows, but over time, like water seeking its own level, we are

pulled toward our baseline—back up after bad news and back down after

good. The euphoria of first love fades, and so does the despair of divorce.

This tendency is best seen with little kids and their toy joy: When they get

what they’ve longed for, they believe they will be happy for the rest of their

lives. And for the first few minutes of the rest of their lives, they are. But

then the kids—like adults—adapt.

There is enormous variance among individuals when it comes to

baseline. This is why our uncle Murray seems perpetually dissatisfied with

life, while our aunt Eileen is delighted with everything for no apparent

reason. Happiness is believed to be one of the most highly heritable aspects

of personality. Twin studies have led to estimates that about 50 percent of

the variance among people in their average levels of happiness can be

explained by differences in their genes rather than in their life experiences.3

Famously, studies of lottery winners have shown that a year after claiming

their prize, winners are approximately as happy (or unhappy) as they were

prior to the windfall.4

Why does your baseline matter when it comes to receiving feedback?

First, people who have higher happiness baselines are more likely to

respond positively to positive feedback than people with lower self-reported

well-being. And people with lower general satisfaction respond more

strongly to negative information.5 Krista has a pretty high baseline, so it’s

not surprising that she’d find honks of marital support exhilarating, and

criticism less emotionally “sticky.” Alita likely has a lower general

baseline, so she may get less of a boost from the positive patient ratings,

and be hit harder by the criticism.

This may seem particularly unfair to Alita. After all, she’s the one who

needs to hear the positive feedback and get the emotional boost it offers.

But don’t worry—there are things Alita can do to turn up the volume on the

positives and temper the negatives when receiving tough feedback. For

now, it’s useful simply to be aware that for her, positive feedback may be

muffled and negatives amplified.

2. Swing: How Far Up or Down You Go

Wherever our natural baseline, some of us swing far in either direction,

even when the input is minor, while others live in a narrower emotional

band. These tendencies appear to be present from birth. Some infants are

more sensitive than others and can experience a strong physiological jolt

even from comparatively small inputs—loud noises, novel situations, or

scary drawings, for example.

Of course, newborns aren’t subjected to performance reviews, and

feedback for adults is rarely accompanied by scary drawings. But it turns

out that infants who are what research psychologist Jerome Kagan calls

“high reactive” are more likely than others to grow into adults who are high

reactives. High reactivity in infants can translate into a big swing for adults.

And we can reasonably assume such adults would be likely to be more

sensitive to negative feedback.6 Brain imaging studies suggest that

differences in sensitivity may correlate with anatomical differences as well.

The adults who had low-reactive infant temperaments had greater thickness

in the left orbitofrontal cortex than the high-reactive group while the adults

categorized as high-reactive infants displayed greater thickness in the right

ventromedial prefrontal cortex.7

Whatever is going on inside our cortexes, differences in swing are easy

to observe within our conference rooms. When a client sends the same

critical comments to both Eliza and Jeron, Eliza is frantic with anxiety

while Jeron has no reaction beyond “Well, this means a bit more work.”

Because Eliza and Jeron are teammates, their disparate reactions create

tension. Jeron thinks Eliza is melodramatic and attention-seeking; Eliza

thinks Jeron is in denial about the depth of the problem. Now they have

feedback for each other about how they are each (mis-)handling the

feedback.

Bad Is Stronger Than Good

Whether we are easily swamped or nearly waterproof, there’s one wiring

challenge we all face: Bad is stronger than good. Psychologist Jonathan

Haidt elaborates: “Responses to threats and unpleasantness are faster,

stronger, and harder to inhibit than responses to opportunities and

pleasures.”8 This observation sheds light on an eternal riddle about

feedback: Why do we dwell on the one criticism buried amid four hundred

compliments?

Built into our wiring is a kind of security team that scans for threat.

When it detects danger—real or perceived—the team responds

instantaneously, bypassing our slower, more reflective systems. The

amygdala is a key player. This small, almond-shaped bundle of neurons sits

at the heart of the limbic system—a part of the brain central to processing

emotion. As Haidt explains:

The amygdala has a direct connection to the brainstem that activates

the fight-or-flight response, and if that amygdala finds a pattern that

was part of a previous fear episode . . . it orders the body to red alert.

. . . the brain has no equivalent “green alert” . . . threats get a

shortcut to your panic button, but there is no equivalent alarm system

for positive information. Bad news is emotionally louder than good,

and thus will have bigger impact.

So why are you still obsessing over that oblique comment your mother-in-

law made during an otherwise lovely holiday visit? Because she unwittingly

activated your red alert system—the one that evolved more than 100 million

years ago9 that was later used to detect snakes, saber-toothed tigers, and

other life-threatening creatures that lurk. Long after your mother-in-law has

left, your emotional brain remains ready for her to pounce.

3. Sustain and Recovery: How Long Does the Swing Last?

Whether you swing wide emotionally or barely budge, the last variable is

duration—how long it takes you to return to your baseline. Do you recover

quickly from even the most distressing feedback, or are you brought low for

weeks or months? And how long do you sustain the high of good news?

When a grateful customer e-mails to extol your expertise, do you have a

bounce in your fingertips for the rest of the day? Or just until you read your

next e-mail? Researcher Richard Davidson has found that the amount of

time that we sustain positive emotion, or need to recover from negative

emotion, can differ by as much as 3,000 percent across individuals.10

Surprisingly, negative feedback and positive feedback are mediated by

different parts of the brain; in fact, they appear to be mediated by different

halves of the brain. And those different halves of the brain can be

differently good at their job. This subject gets complicated quickly, but

there are some simple insights that emerge from the research on this front.

Negative Recovery: Righty or Lefty?

It’s crucial to have a red alert system for threats, but due to the high number

of false alarms encountered in everyday life, it’s just as crucial to have a

way to turn the alarm off.

The amygdala is a key player in the alert system, but it’s no lone cowboy.

The frontal cortex runs the show, working to integrate the emotional

response with the actual content of the feedback. The frontal cortex can

contain or intensify the stampedes that the amygdala starts.

Sitting just behind your forehead, your prefrontal cortex is the seat of

higher-order reasoning, judgment, and decision making. Like other parts of

your brain, it is divided in two, with a right and left side. When you

experience negative feelings like fear, anxiety, and disgust, your brain

shows increased activity on the right side. When you experience positive

feelings like amusement, hope, and love, your brain shows increased

activity on the left side. Researchers have termed this the “valence

hypothesis,” suggesting that people who have more activity on the right

side (“cortical righties”) tend to be more depressed and more anxious;

cortical lefties tend to be happier.11 (We shouldn’t overstate current

scientific consensus; this “locational” theory of emotion is not without

controversy.)12

With the help of imaging devices like functional MRIs, which reveal

how the brain responds to particular stimuli, neuroscientists are beginning

to understand how recovery from negative emotion may work. Surprisingly,

it’s the left side—the positive side—that seems to be responsible here.

While the amygdala is fanning the flames of fear and anxiety, activity in the

left side of the brain exerts a calming influence. Strong activity on the left is

associated with quicker recovery from upset.

People who are faster to recover not only have more activity in the left

side; they also tend to have more connections (“white matter” pathways that

connect brain regions to one another) running between the left side of the

prefrontal cortex and the amygdala.13 This appears to create more

bandwidth along which the positive messages can travel to the amygdala.

People with numerous connections effectively have a superhighway to

deliver reassuring signals, while those who are slower to recover have

narrow country roads.

The bottom line is that people whose brain wiring and organization are

more right-sided, or righties, are slower than lefties to recover from

negative feedback. Recovery is slower whether the feedback is small (you

forgot to take out the garbage . . .) or large (. . . and therefore I’m leaving

you).14

If we hooked up Alita to an fMRI while she read the criticism about

keeping patients waiting, we’d likely see activity in her amygdala and right

prefrontal cortex increase. “There’s danger!” yells the amygdala. “It’s a

disaster!” confirms the right prefrontal cortex. In contrast, activity in Alita’s

left prefrontal cortex—the more positive side—would show comparatively

less activity. “Let’s all just calm down. Lots of patients appreciate the time

you spend with them,” says the left, but too faintly to be heard above the

bluster of disaster and doom.

Alita is likely a cortical righty. Compared with a less sensitive colleague,

she’ll feel more physiologically aroused, more anxious, more depressed. It

will be harder for her to find hope or humor (which are mediated more by

the left side) and more difficult for her to calm herself down.

Krista’s fMRI in the same situation would likely show a different pattern.

Initially, she might feel anxious, angry, or hurt (Krista’s amygdala will light

up, too), but her strong left prefrontal cortex will soon kick in, quieting

down the quick emotional response: “Relax, don’t overreact. Most of your

patients love you, and anyway, motherhood is all about learning patience, so

you’re giving them a head start. C’mon, let’s go have some Mexican food.”

While a fast recovery time has real advantages—those who are resilient

are more likely to respond to setbacks with energy and determination and

less likely to suffer from depression—being at the extreme end of this scale

presents its own challenges as far as feedback is concerned. Because

negative feedback has less emotional resonance for Krista, it may not

adequately catch her attention or even stick in memory. She may be

dismissive of suggestions or lack motivation to work on improving. Those

around her may see her as callous to the concerns of others, not because she

doesn’t care, but because she doesn’t always realize how serious their

concerns are. And anyway, she’s moved on.

Sustaining Positive Feelings

Recovery measures how quickly you emerge from the abyss of upsetting

feedback. Sustain measures how long positive feedback has you walking on

air.

What’s going on in the brain that helps us sustain positive feelings? We

need to zoom in on a cluster of neurons inside the ventral striatum called

the nucleus accumbens. This region sits just in front of your temple and is

part of the mesolimbic pathway—sometimes called the “reward pathway”

or “pleasure center”—which is responsible for releasing dopamine, which

in turn prompts feelings of pleasure, desire, and motivation. Connected to

that upbeat left side of the prefrontal cortex, the nucleus accumbens creates

a circuit in which positive experiences trigger a dopamine response, which

triggers more positive feelings, which triggers more dopamine.15

Both Krista and Alita feel an uptick in joy when given a positive boost,

whether it’s a honk of marital support or the cry of a newly delivered baby

boy. But Krista’s nucleus accumbens stays active, continuing to release

dopamine and maintaining the emotional high long after the honk fades. For

Alita, the positive feelings evaporate in minutes.

Just as we can retrigger negative feelings by recalling negative feedback,

we can extend our positive sustain by recalling positive feedback—

replaying that appreciative comment from a customer or reminding

ourselves that no matter what happens at work, we’ve got nine kids who

love us at home. Or perhaps remembering that no matter what happens at

home, our kids aren’t allowed to follow us to work.

Our sustain and recovery tendencies can create virtuous and vicious

cycles. If you find it easier to sustain positive emotion, you can ride the

boosts you get from happy moments large (We landed the account!) and

small (That was a great cup of coffee!). You might reread positive feedback

from your child’s teacher or from a grateful constituent when you need a

reminder that you’re doing something right. Positive feedback sticks, and

helps you turn the corner to recovering your equilibrium. This sense of

control over your emotional state means you feel more confident about your

ability to cope with whatever life throws your way. You will tend to be

optimistic that the future will be bright and confident that regardless, you’ll

manage things well. That’s a pretty good definition of peace of mind.

But when positive sustain is weak, it’s harder to remember what you’re

doing right, and pessimism seems the more realistic outlook. If you’ve been

low and had trouble recovering, you may doubt your ability to pull yourself

up the next time you stumble into a particularly troubling time. This can

produce a challenging combination of pessimism and self-doubt. This is

where baseline, swing, and sustain come full circle and together constitute

what is sometimes referred to as temperament.16

Four Sustain/Recovery Combinations

Krista has both quick recovery and long sustain. Her nature enables her to

bounce back quickly from adversity and to luxuriate in life’s joys. Alita is

the opposite on both fronts; she takes longer to recover from negatives and

has more trouble sustaining positives.

But these aren’t the only two sustain/recovery combinations, because

how long you sustain negative feelings operates independently from how

long you sustain positive ones. From a purely physiological point of view,

there are four combinations of sustain/recover tendencies. The chart below

doesn’t address whether you receive feedback skillfully, or whether you

find it helpful and important to learning. It merely suggests different

variations on how you might experience feedback, given your wiring. It’s

an oversimplification, but the categories are illuminating.

WIRING IS ONLY PART OF THE STORY

The danger when talking about brain wiring and temperament is that we

take our wiring as fixed and assume it is destiny. It’s neither.

There are genetic bases to our temperament; understanding this helps us

understand ourselves, and this offers insight into why others are different

from us. But while aspects of our temperament are inherited, there is ample

evidence that they are not fixed. Practices such as meditation, serving

others, and exercise can raise your baseline over time, and life events that

involve trauma or depression can have a profound impact as well. This

growing understanding of neuroplasticity is a thrilling reminder that even

wiring changes over time in response to our environment and experiences.

THE MAGIC 40

Perhaps more important, our wiring—whether fixed or not—tells only part

of the story. Research suggests a 50-40-10 formula for happiness: About 50

percent of our happiness is wired in. Another 40 percent can be attributed to

how we interpret and respond to what happens to us, and 10 percent is

driven by our circumstances—where we live and with whom, where we

work and with whom, the state of our health, and so forth.17 Whether these

are exactly the right proportions is obviously debatable, but what’s certain

is that there is a lot of room to move in that magic middle of around 40

percent. That’s the piece we have control over—the way we interpret what

happens, the meaning we make, and the stories we tell ourselves.

Indeed, University of Pennsylvania researcher Marty Seligman suggests

that for some people, these interpretations and responses can help turn post-

traumatic stress into post-traumatic growth.18 Our interpretations and

responses to what happens to us—and to the feedback we get—can help

turn upsetting feedback and even failure into learning.

But there’s a catch.

Our emotions have so profound an influence on how we interpret what

happens and the stories we tell about it that, in the wake of upsetting

feedback, our upset itself distorts what we think the feedback means. Our

boss offers us some gentle advice that is as harmless as a kitten. But in the

flush of anxiety, the advice appears to us as threatening as a tiger, poised to

rip us apart.

EMOTIONS DISTORT OUR SENSE OF THE FEEDBACK ITSELF

If we’re going to get better at handling tough feedback, we have to

understand how emotions interact with, and distort, the stories we tell about

what the feedback means. Is it really just a kitten, or is it a tiger? Or is it

something else altogether?

OUR STORIES HAVE AN EMOTIONAL SOUNDTRACK

As we discuss in chapter 3, we don’t live our life in data, but in stories—big

stories, like who we are and what we care about and why we’re here, and

smaller stories, like whether we embarrassed ourselves at the company

picnic last weekend.

And these stories are made not only of thoughts but of feelings. We don’t

experience them as separate. We don’t think: Here’s a thought and here’s a

feeling. At any given moment we have a seamless awareness of our life. It’s

similar to the way a music soundtrack works in a movie. When we’re

absorbed in a good movie, we don’t notice the swell and fade of the

soundtrack. The music adds to the suspense, the excitement, the poignancy

of the plot, yet we are as unaware of the music as we are of the projector.

Most of the time that’s a good thing. A movie is better when we get lost

in it and the same is true in life. When we are at our most engaged, most

creative, and most energized, we achieve that delicious state of

unselfconsciousness called “flow.”19 But when things go wrong, it’s worth

slowing things down to observe the effect our emotions are having on how

we tell the story.

THOUGHTS + FEELINGS = STORY

Someone behind you honks when the light changes. You don’t think: That

person behind me honked. You instantly embellish that thought into a story:

Dude! Obnoxious people like you are what’s wrong with this town these

days.

How you feel in that moment has a big impact on the story you tell

yourself. If you are already in a dark mood, you’ll tell a darker story. If

you’re frustrated, you’ll tell a frustrated story. If you’re sitting at the light

feeling like a loser, and the guy behind you honks, it’s just another example

of you being a loser. You can’t even drive right. That guy sees right into

your sad, incompetent soul. Thanks, pal, but I already know. If you’re

newly in love, you’ll feel patient and generous: Oops, sorry about that, I

was doing a little daydreaming there at the light. But ain’t life grand?

In these examples, the feeling comes first. The feeling colors the story

and influences how we perceive the characters in it. But there’s a second

pattern between thoughts and feelings, and confusingly, it’s just the

opposite: Sometimes the thought is first, and the feelings follow.

For instance, I may have started my journey feeling just fine, but then I

looked at the clock and saw that I might miss my flight. A story unfolds in

my mind about how the rest of the day will play out—I’ll miss my flight by

seconds, I won’t make the meeting this afternoon, my client is going to be

annoyed, my boss will be apoplectic. And now—because of these thoughts

—I’m on edge. In this case, the feelings follow the thoughts.

Jonathan Haidt gives us a glimpse of the biology behind this intertwining

of thoughts and feeling:

Not only does [the amygdala] reach down to the brainstem to trigger

a response to danger but it reaches up to the frontal cortex to change

your thinking. It shifts the entire brain over to a withdrawal

orientation. There is a two-way street between emotions and conscious

thoughts: Thoughts can cause emotions (as when you reflect on a

foolish thing you said), but emotions can also cause thoughts. . . . 20

There’s a key insight that follows from this observation that is relevant for

feedback: If our stories are a result of our feelings plus our thoughts, then

we can change our stories by working to change either our feelings or our

thoughts. So there are two ways in.

HOW FEELINGS EXAGGERATE FEEDBACK

Let’s start by looking at the predictable ways that feelings distort our

stories. Knowing those patterns is crucial to being able to tell a less

distorted story.

When it comes to feedback, strong feelings push us toward extreme

interpretations. One thing becomes everything, now becomes always, partly

becomes entirely, and slightly becomes extremely. Feelings skew our sense

of the past, present, and future. They distort our stories about who we are,

how others see us, and what the consequences of the feedback will be.

Below are three common patterns of distortion.

OUR PAST: THE GOOGLE BIAS

Today’s upsetting feedback can influence the story we tell about yesterday:

Suddenly what comes to mind is all the damning evidence of past failures,

earlier poor choices, and bygone bad behavior.

It’s a little like using Google. If you Google “dictators,” you’re going to

pull up 8.4 million examples that mention dictators. It seems that dictators

are everywhere; you can’t swing a cat without hitting one. But that doesn’t

mean most people are dictators or that most countries are run by dictators.

Filling your head with dictator stories doesn’t mean there are more

dictators, and ignoring dictator stories doesn’t mean there are fewer.

When you feel lousy about yourself, you are effectively Googling

“Things that are wrong with me.” You will pull up 8.4 million examples,

and suddenly you are pathetic. You see “sponsored ads” from your exes,

father, and boss. You can’t recall a single thing you’ve ever done right.

Google search parody designed by Sarah Seminski

We all have our own ways of experiencing these distortions. Marc describes

how the “Google bias” manifests for him:

The feedback could be small, but if I’m feeling vulnerable, it’s as if I

fall through the floor, plunged into the basement where all the things

I’ve ever regretted are collected. It’s as if they are happening all at

once, right now. I feel guilty about the people I’ve hurt and ashamed

of the selfish things I’ve done. When I’m not in the basement I literally

don’t think about it. But when I’m there, it’s the only reality, my

failures surround me, and I can’t believe I was ever happy.

Of course, when you feel good, the Google bias tilts in the other direction,

offering up the successes and the wise and generous choices that have led

inexorably to your bountiful life. You rock and always have. Either way,

when it comes to your stories about yourself, you get what you Google.

OUR PRESENT: NOT ONE THING, EVERYTHING

When we feel happy and healthy, we are able to contain negative feedback

to the topic or trait under scrutiny and to the person doing the “scruting.”

We are hearing the feedback as it was meant. If you are told you sing off

key, you think, Okay, this person thinks I sang that song off key. The

feedback is about singing one song. And it’s from one person.

But if you’re in the grip of strong emotion, negative feedback floods

across boundaries into other areas of your self-image: I sing off key? I can’t

do anything right. We rush from “I have trouble closing certain kinds of

deals” to “I’m no good at my job,” and from “My colleague has a concern”

to “Everybody on the team hates me.”

Flooding can also drown out any positive attributes that might lend

balance to the picture. Whether you sing off key has no bearing on your

long-standing commitment to improving your community’s social services,

your tenacious dedication to your daughter, or the astonishing quality of

your slow-roast short ribs. But when we get flooded, that’s all washed away.

OUR FUTURE: THE FOREVER BIAS AND SNOWBALLING

Feelings affect not only how we recall the past, but how we imagine the

future. When we feel bad, we assume we will always feel bad. You feel

humiliated by the shoddy presentation you gave at the joint venture launch

and assume that you will feel precisely this humiliated up to the moment of

your death.

And perhaps worse, we engage in catastrophic thinking, and our stories

can eventually snowball out of control.21 A specific and contained piece of

feedback steadily turns into an ever more ominous future disaster: “I had

mayonnaise on my cheek during the date” becomes “I will die alone.”

What’s so amazing about these distortions is how real they appear to us

in the moment. Common sense suggests that the bigger the gap between our

thoughts and reality, the more likely we would be to notice that the two are

misaligned. But unless we are consciously looking for it, we can’t see the

gap when we’re in it, so the size is irrelevant.

The strong feelings triggered by feedback can cause us to distort our

thinking about the past, the present, and the future. Learning to regain our

balance so that we can accurately assess the feedback is first a matter of

rewinding our thoughts and straightening them out. Once we’ve gotten the

feedback in realistic perspective, we have a real shot at learning from it.

In the next chapter, “Dismantle Distortions,” we’ll look at strategies for

straightening out distorted thinking, so that we can more accurately assess

the feedback we get.

Summary: SOME KEY IDEAS

Wiring matters.

Baseline, Swing, and Sustain/Recovery vary by as much as 3,000

percent among individuals.

If we have a lower baseline, the volume will be turned down on the

positives, and up on the negatives.

Emotions distort our stories about the feedback itself.

The Google bias magnifies the negatives and collapses the past and the

present.

One thing becomes everything and everyone.

The forever bias makes the future look bleak.

DISMANTLE DISTORTIONS

See Feedback at “Actual Size”

One of the biggest blocks to receiving feedback well is that we exaggerate

it. Fueled by emotion, our story about what the feedback says grows so

large and so damning that we are overwhelmed by it. Learning is the least

of our worries; we’re just trying to survive.

In order to understand and assess the feedback, we first have to dismantle

the distortions. This doesn’t mean pretending that negative feedback is

positive or adopting untethered optimism. It means finding ways to turn

down the volume on that ominous soundtrack playing in our minds so that

we can hear the dialogue more clearly.

SETH TAKES A RELAXING VACATION

Seth is a counselor who works with children who have experienced trauma

and loss. He needs to address some performance issues with a supervisee,

and asks his boss to sit in on the conversation. During the meeting Seth is

watching the clock; he’s catching a flight to Atlanta tonight to celebrate his

recently widowed father’s birthday tomorrow. Seth has spent hours

planning the party, and both father and son have been looking forward to

the weekend all month.

Toward the end of the meeting, Seth’s boss suddenly pipes up. He laughs

and says reassuringly to Seth’s supervisee: “Well, we all have trouble with

being organized. I mean, geez, look at Seth!”

It’s a kick in the teeth. Seth has always struggled with being organized

and now here it is, trumpeted by his boss, in front of a subordinate, no less.

He is instantly nauseated and can’t think straight. He looks dumbly at his

supervisee, his face burning. The meeting ends, but Seth has no recollection

of how. Shame and despair darken his thoughts: I’m a complete mess. I’ll

never succeed in this job. My personal life is a mess, too, and no wonder.

Feeling desperate to fix the situation, Seth decides to cancel his trip and

stay the weekend to try to get his life organized. How could he even have

scheduled such a trip? What kind of idiotic judgment was involved in

deciding to jet off across the country to a party?

In the end, Seth goes. Why? Because his plane ticket is nonrefundable,

and wasting money (additional evidence of idiocy) feels even worse than

wasting time. He spends the flight consumed with anxiety.

From sheer exhaustion Seth manages to get a decent night’s sleep, and

the next day he is absorbed by the party preparation and the party itself. He

ends up having a wonderful time. Seth and his father talk wistfully of his

recently departed mom; their conversation stretches deep into the night, and

the time he spends with his father becomes one of Seth’s fondest memories.

He wouldn’t trade it for all the money in the world.

In retrospect, Seth finds his initial reaction to his boss’s comment

incomprehensible. It seems obvious to him now that his boss was merely

trying to use humor—whether joke or jibe—to make a connection with the

supervisee. Seth can’t explain why his boss’s comment set off such an

explosion in his mind.

But we can. Like Alita, Seth is on the sensitive end of the wiring

spectrum. He is easily triggered, and once triggered, his strong feelings

shape and distort the story he tells about what the feedback means. As a

result, he loses his balance. When he eventually regains it, Seth has trouble

figuring out what, if anything, he has learned from the incident. He’s

hesitant to go back to his boss and discuss the matter, because he worries

that he’ll just get triggered again.

FIVE WAYS TO DISMANTLE DISTORTIONS

In order to learn from upsetting feedback, we need strategies to counter the

distortions that we bring to it, whether during the feedback conversation

itself, beforehand (in preparation), or afterward (in reflection). Below are

five strategies that help.

1. BE PREPARED, BE MINDFUL

As Seth’s story illustrates, we don’t always have the chance to prepare for

feedback. Sometimes it calls ahead, other times it just shows up at the door.

Feedback has its own etiquette.

But when we’re able, it’s useful to think in advance about the

conversation—to consider how we will feel and respond if we hear things

that we disagree with or find upsetting. This can give us a preview of our

reactions and allow us to think about issues of identity and well-being while

we are still feeling balanced.

Know Your Feedback Footprint

Each of us has our own set of reactive behaviors in response to criticism,

our own feedback footprint: Bryan blames others; Claire switchtracks; Anu

cries; Alfie apologizes; Mick chatters; Hester goes silent; Fergie agrees

while quietly resolving never to change. Reynolds lawyers up, emotionally

speaking, and Jody becomes awkwardly friendly. And at least sometimes,

Seth panics.

We each have our own personal stages of acceptance and rejection as

well. Some of us kick and claw in the moment but over time come around

to accepting the possibility of change. Others move in the opposite

direction: Initially they assume that everything they’re hearing is valid and

true, but on reflection, they dismiss much of it. Some people postpone

engaging and decide they will figure things out later—and then make sure

never to think about it again. Others obsess over the feedback and stop only

when a new obsession takes hold.

Regardless of whether your reactions are productive or debilitating, it’s

enormously helpful to be aware of your particular patterns. It’s especially

important to figure out how you tend to respond during that first stage—I

run, I fight, I deny, I exaggerate—so that you can recognize your usual

reaction and name it to yourself in the moment. If you name it, you have

some power over it.

Figuring out your patterns is as simple as asking yourself this question:

“How do I typically react?” If you’re like most people, as examples come to

mind, you’ll dismiss each as an exception to how you actually are. But

those exceptions aren’t exceptions: They are how you are. If you’re having

trouble discerning your footprint, ask those around you. As they describe

your defensive behavior, you can notice yourself getting defensive about it.

Then you’ll know.

Inoculate Yourself Against the Worst

Your footprint will show up strongest when the feedback is toughest. If

you’re about to get some news—perhaps you’re awaiting word from

colleges or funders or the Nobel Prize Committee—a useful way to manage

your own tendencies is to imagine that the news is bad. Think through in

advance the worst that could happen, try it on emotionally, and reason

through the possible consequences. If that sounds like advice to be

pessimistic, it’s actually the opposite. It is a reminder that whatever the

outcome, you’ll be able to manage.

This exercise has a few benefits. First, it acts as an inoculation. When

you get inoculated, you receive a tiny bit of the virus, easily handled by

your immune system. If you are then exposed to the real thing, your body

recognizes the threat and knows how to deal with it. In the same way, when

actual bad news arrives you’ll think, Yes, this is what I feared might happen.

I’ve seen this before. I’ll be okay. The feelings that come over you and the

images in your head are a bit more familiar and a bit less shocking.

Second, you can think through in a balanced and unhurried way what the

news might mean for you and what actions you would take if you received

it. If your start-up doesn’t get funded, you’ll regroup and restart the process,

or you’ll go with the scaled-down Plan B. You might talk to people who

have endured similar setbacks. The guy down the street worked for years on

his life’s dream only to have his proposal shot down by every potential

investor he met. Contact that guy and ask him some questions: How did he

survive? What helped? What did he learn? Were there any unexpected

benefits to the rejection? How does he think about it now?

Notice What’s Happening

During the feedback conversation itself, periodically check in on yourself

and slow things down. Self-observation awakens your left prefrontal cortex

—which is where the pleasures associated with learning are located.

Seth has been working to improve his awareness of what’s happening in

the moment: “As quickly as I can, I now think to myself, ‘Okay, this is that

thing I do, that triggered thought pattern I get into, and that sick feeling I

get.’ And that one thought really helps. I’m not fighting or resisting my

thoughts and reactions; I’m just noticing them. Once I think, ‘Yep, this is

the part where I have my overreactions,’ I actually start to calm down.”

2. SEPARATE THE STRANDS: FEELING / STORY / FEEDBACK

As you get better at slowing things down and noticing what’s going on in

your mind and body, you can begin to sort through your reactions. You’ll

get better at distinguishing your emotions from the story you tell about the

feedback, and distinguishing both of these from what the feedback giver

actually said.

Whether you do this sorting during the conversation or on reflection

afterward, “separating the strands” is crucial to winding back the distortions

that creep into your interpretation of the feedback. It’s like separating the

soundtrack from the scene when watching a movie. You are pulling apart

the different threads so that you can see each element more clearly, and

observe how each is affecting the other.

You do this by asking yourself three questions:

What do I feel?

What’s the story I’m telling (and inside that story, what’s the

threat)?

What’s the actual feedback?

What do I feel? As you observe how you feel (or remember how you

felt), try to name the feeling: anxiety, shame, anger, sadness, surprise. Work

hard to notice how the feeling feels—physically—the same way you would

describe the physical symptoms of food poisoning or the flu. Seth

elaborates: “I feel a jolt of adrenaline that is by now very familiar to me. It’s

what I imagine an electric shock feels like. And then I often feel sick to my

stomach and slightly faint. It’s intensely unpleasant.”

What’s the story I’m telling (and inside the story, what’s the threat)? As

you notice your story about what the feedback means, don’t worry about

whether it’s true or false, right or wrong, sensible or crazy; for now, just

listen to it. Pay special attention to the threat. It could be about a bad thing

that might happen as a result of the feedback, or about what this means for

how others see you or how you see yourself. Seth examines his reaction to

his boss’s comment: “I’ve always worried that my boss has a kind of free-

floating disapproval of me. So when he made the ‘disorganized’ comment, I

thought, ‘I knew it!’ and then my thoughts snowballed: ‘This job is the best

opportunity I’ll ever have and I’ve messed it up. I mess up everything and I

can’t stand it.’ So there are a few threats in there: that my boss disapproves

of me, that I will lose my job, that I won’t be able to live with myself.

Ultimately, that I’ll just be unhappy all the time.”

What’s the actual feedback? Our mind takes what was said and

immediately tells a story. It’s important to peel back that story and ask

yourself, what exactly was the feedback? What was said? With Seth, it was

his boss’s single comment about “everyone” being disorganized, including

Seth. Everything else going on in Seth’s mind beyond that was his own

story—his assumptions about what his boss must have meant, his fears

about losing his job, his concern about how he would live with himself.

The point is not that everything we add to the story is wrong. But we

have to be clear about what we’ve added, and be aware of our patterns over

time for the kinds of things we tend to add. Once we see the strands clearly,

we can begin the work of assessing whether our story is reasonably aligned

with the actual feedback, or whether and how it’s distorted.1

Our Stories Shadowbox with the Past

Sometimes the threat in the story is obvious; other times it’s harder to see.

The feedback seems small or inconsequential or there doesn’t seem to be

any threat at all. And yet, on receiving the feedback, we become angry or

despairing.

This happens when today’s little story gets linked to larger stories from

our past.

There’s often a kind of “last straw” dynamic to this. Over the years,

you’ve gotten bits of feedback that have piled up. Each individual piece of

feedback seems like nothing—just another weightless comment—and

you’ve kept it all in proportion. Until now. This most recent bit of feedback

is suddenly, unaccountably, more than you can bear.

Your neighbor complains that you don’t keep your lawn as well

manicured as you should. You snap: “Fine. Don’t look at it.” You storm off

and seethe for the rest of the day.

Why has your neighbor’s feedback set you off? Because you’ve been

told your whole life that you are slightly oblivious to social norms—that

manners matter, that you should tuck in your shirt, and that you should

wrap your gifts. You usually shrug off such comments; you know in your

heart that you have your priorities straight about what really matters in life.

But this comment was the last straw.

This often happens when we have open wounds. Your colleague suggests

you speak with more authority in meetings, and you flip out. You were

bullied as a kid; you rode the bench on the soccer team because you were

not aggressive enough on the field; your partner broke up with you because

you never seemed to have an opinion. All unrelated life events, but each

aggravates the same wound that never quite healed. On the face of it, your

colleague’s comment was small and contained, and offered with respect and

care. But while the feedback is mild, the wound is deep.

So, are you overreacting to the current feedback? Yes and no. Yes, your

emotional reaction is out of proportion, and when you calm down you will

be able to see that. But it is a reasonable emotional reaction to the pattern

your brain is recognizing; it’s the latest chapter in a long story. And while

your current quarrel is with the wrong person—it’s really with your bully or

your coach or your ex-partner—inside your head it’s all part of the same

frustrating mess.

The goal in untangling the strands of emotion, story, and feedback is to

see what you’ve woven in that does and doesn’t belong there. And the more

clearly you see that, the better able you are to keep the feedback in

perspective.

3. CONTAIN THE STORY

As we try to make sense of the world, there are a number of rules about the

way the world works that we normally (if unconsciously) follow. They’re

like laws of physics for stories. For example, we know:

Time: The present does not change the past. The present

influences, but does not determine, the future.

Specificity: Being lousy at one thing does not make us lousy

at unrelated things. Being lousy at something now doesn’t

mean we will always be lousy at it.

People: If one person doesn’t like us it doesn’t mean that

everyone doesn’t like us. Even a person who doesn’t like us

usually likes some things about us. And people’s views of us

can change over time.

In the wake of strong feelings, these rules are forgotten, and the feedback

expands in all directions. As we saw in chapter 7, each thing becomes

everything, nothing is contained, and we are knocked off balance.

But we can rebuild and reinforce the distinctions that matter. One way to

do that is by noticing which of the above rules your story is violating and

revising your story to be consistent with them. If the feedback is about right

now, am I turning it into always—always was, always will be? If the

feedback is about a specific skill or action, am I turning it into all of my

skills and all of my actions? If it’s from one person, am I imagining that it’s

from everyone?

When you notice that the feedback has stampeded over whatever barriers

should keep it in place, you have to round up the feedback, and drop it back

into the area where it belongs. Below, we offer three useful tools to help

you do that: the Feedback Containment Chart, the Balancing Picture, and

Right Sizing.

Use a Feedback Containment Chart

Filling out a Feedback Containment Chart helps you to see the feedback (so

you don’t deny it), while at the same time helping you to contain it (so you

don’t exaggerate it). Asking, what is this feedback not about? gives you a

structured way of staying balanced.

Feedback Containment Chart

What is this about? What isn’t this about?

Whether this person still loves me. Whether I’m lovable, whether I’ll find love.

Whether I’m as productive as I might be on

the publications front.

Whether I’m a good clinician, a smart colleague, a

valued team member.

Whether my first YouTube video was as

good as I wanted it to be.

Whether I will ever make a video that gets positive

response.

Whether I’m patient with the kids in the

evenings.

Whether my kids know I love them, and whether I’m

patient much of the time.

For example: You apply for your dream job and don’t get it. Your first

thought is: I’ll never get a job I like. Now, break it down into the two

columns in the chart. What is this not about? It doesn’t predict your future.

It doesn’t tell you if you’ll get the next job. It doesn’t say that you will

never work in your chosen field.

As you rope off the things it’s not about, it’s easier to see and learn from

what it is about. Maybe there are qualifications the employer is looking for

that you still don’t have. Or maybe you have them but aren’t presenting

yourself in quite the right way. Figuring out what the feedback is actually

about, and then doing something about it, takes work, but it becomes easier

when you realize that you need to work on one or two discrete things, and

not everything.

Draw the Balancing Picture

You know logically that you are overreacting to one negative student

comment in a series of generally high ratings, but you find it hard on an

emotional level to keep that comment in perspective. It helps to get visual:

You can illustrate the balance as a drawing, a pie chart, a Post-it collage on

your bathroom mirror, a macaroni sculpture.

Below, we see how Alita and Krista choose to depict balance. When

Alita draws a representation of the range of patient feedback, she’s shocked

at how different the balance of positives and negatives feels when rendered

this way. Krista’s task, in contrast, is to remind herself that she’s gotten

feedback at all.

When you visualize the feedback in these ways, you literally see the

proportions rather than just intuiting them. Your drawing is not some final

“truth” about the feedback. But seeing it in front of you, looking so

different from how it feels, helps you loosen up your story, and let go of

exaggerated conclusions or unfounded fears.

Right-Size the Future Consequences

Feedback is not just about how you see yourself; it often involves real-

world consequences. If you fail your pilot’s license test, it’s not just a blow

to your self-confidence; it prevents you from flying. When that guy you like

shows up at the holiday party with his new special someone, you might feel

bad about yourself—but also, you won’t be kissing that guy anytime soon.

And getting a poor evaluation at work is not just about your performance,

it’s about your paycheck. If you didn’t get a raise, that’s not a “distortion” in

your thinking. There’s a dollar amount printed right there on your check. It

seems that in regard to the consequences of feedback, there isn’t much play

in the joints.

But there is. While consequences are “objective,” we still have our story

about what the consequences mean, and this is where distortions and

assumptions creep in. If you decide that not getting a raise means you’re a

“failure,” well, that’s a ridiculously broad conclusion to draw from the

circumstance.

In addition, when in the grip of upsetting feedback, we often fail to

distinguish between consequences that will happen and consequences that

might happen. Your boss was clear that you’re not getting a pay raise. But

having your spouse leave you because you didn’t get that pay raise is only

something that might happen (and presumably the chances are small). Yet in

the moment of receiving the bad news, the chances don’t feel small. So you

worry about it as if it will happen. We all do this on occasion—as if we

didn’t have enough to worry about already.

As Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert notes in Stumbling on

Happiness, “[w]hen people are asked to predict how they’ll feel if they lose

a job or a romantic partner . . . they consistently overestimate how awful

they’ll feel and how long they’ll feel awful.”2 And that’s further

compounded by our tendency to underestimate how resilient we are likely

to be in the face of actual loss.

Let’s take an example: Recently retired, you’ve just been diagnosed with

severe arthritis in your shoulder. You can no longer swim, and this is no

small matter. Until the arthritis, your daily swimming regimen was your big

hobby and a great source of joy. So the diagnosis is terribly disappointing,

and apparently there’s nothing you can do about it. The consequences are

what they are: no more swimming.

When you imagine what all this will mean for you, you picture your

future life as being the same as your current life, except that where once

there was swimming, there’s now a gaping hole. What will you do for fun,

exercise, and community? You assume the answer is, you will do nothing.

But that’s unlikely. Something will replace swimming, and whatever it is

will serve many of the same purposes that swimming served.

In fact, ten years ago you hurt your lower back, which ruled out playing

tennis. At the time, tennis was your greatest love and you despaired of ever

finding something as healthy and fulfilling. And then you started

swimming.

So when we think about the consequences of feedback, the goal is not to

dismiss them or pretend they don’t matter. The goal is to right-size them, to

develop a realistic and healthy sense of what might happen and respond in

line with these reasonable possibilities. After all, our predictions about life

are just predictions, and they are often just plain wrong.

4. CHANGE YOUR VANTAGE POINT

Anything that helps you see a dark situation from a different point of view

is beneficial. Here are a few ways to step outside your default perspective.

Imagine You’re an Observer

Feedback packs an emotional punch because it’s about you. If the exact

same feedback were directed at, say, your sister, you might be able to

explain to her that it is not so terribly serious and offer her advice on how to

cope. Not just because you’re trying to be helpful, but because from your

perspective, she really is overreacting: “Mom said that to you? It means

nothing. That’s how she is these days. Why do you even care? You’re an

adult!”

Exactly. But if Mom had directed that comment at you, well, that would

be different. You’d begin to wonder, Why would Mom say that? Is she upset

with me? Maybe she’s disappointed with how my life has turned out. Does

she still love me? Did she ever love me? When you share your fears with

your sister, she’s incredulous: “What?! That one stupid comment is still

bugging you? Why are you worrying about that? It meant nothing. That’s

how she is these days, and anyway, you’re an adult!”

We can use this difference between being the object and the observer to

our advantage. When we get feedback—when we are the object—we can

imagine how we might react if instead we were the friend, the sibling, the

observer. Try it as a thought experiment. You’ll be surprised by how

dramatic the difference in perspective is—even when you know it’s just a

thought experiment. Once you’ve shifted perspectives in this way, you can

take your own advice. Why are you still thinking about that comment your

mom made? That’s just how she is now.

Of course, you can also solicit actual advice from a friend. That

disturbing e-mail from your colleague? Show it to your friend and see if it

sounds as damning to them as it does to you. Are you giving it too much

weight? Too little? Some friends are better than others at offering this kind

of support, but anyone who’s not you is a good start.

Look Back from the Future

Try looking back on your life from the vantage point of ten or twenty or

forty years from now. Ask yourself how significant today’s events are likely

to seem in the grand scheme of things. You might still find the current

feedback challenging or the news regrettable, but in your final days, you’re

much more likely to regret the time you spent fretting. Today feels big right

now, but from the perspective of many days hence, it will look pretty small.

Cast the Comedy

It’s been said that comedy is tragedy plus time. The sooner you adopt that

viewpoint, the better. Humor—even or especially gallows humor—offers a

release from the emotional tension of a miserable moment, inviting you to

see yourself and your life as an amusing play, with the usual array of

hapless characters and interesting plot twists. If you can see humor in the

situation, it means you’re succeeding in gaining perspective.

The ability to laugh at yourself is also an indicator that you are ready and

able to take feedback. Laughing at yourself requires you to loosen your grip

on your identity. You have to align yourself with the world and to let go of

trying to align the world to you. Your friend points out that the e-mail you

sent him correcting his grammar had spelling mistakes. Your first instinct is

to defend yourself: “Well, I was rushed when I sent you that e-mail.

Obviously I know how to spell those words.” But notice what happens

when you think about it this way: Ha! You got me. It takes so much less

energy.

Humor forces your brain to shift into a different emotional state. It taps

that positive left side of your prefrontal cortex, where amusement lives.

When you think something is funny, you are helping to disrupt the panic

and anxiety that are taking hold, and to calm down those upsetting signals.

Juliet, emotionally wrung out, puts down her wineglass and smiles.

“So . . . boy meets girl. Boy deceives, betrays, and dumps girl. Girl will

never date another bad boy because she has finally learned her lesson. Wait,

who’s that super-hot drummer over there?”

At least that names the problem.

5. ACCEPT THAT YOU CAN’T CONTROL HOW OTHERS SEE YOU

How others see us and how we see ourselves are inevitably intertwined. We

need others—their perspective on us—in order to see ourselves clearly.

Their view may be only one piece of the puzzle, but it’s an important piece.

It’s like the horseradish in the cocktail sauce: You don’t want to eat the

horseradish alone, but the sauce won’t taste right without it.

So understandably, we care how others see us. But at the end of the day,

we have to accept the fact that how others see us is something we can’t

control. Others’ views of you may be incomplete, outdated, unfair, and

based on absolutely nothing. Or most annoying, they may be claiming

something about you that is actually true only about them. I’m nasty and

self-serving? Really? You’re the one who’s nasty and self-serving! In one

stroke, you are falsely accused and they are falsely exonerated.

We can become obsessed with the desire to get others to admit they are

wrong and to change their views about us. How can we accomplish this?

We can’t. No matter how wrong and unfair their view of you might be, you

can’t control what others think. You love watching football because of the

chesslike intricacies of the strategy involved, but your coworker insists it’s

your adolescent attempt to mask your insecure masculinity. You figure that

if anyone would know why you like football or whether you feel secure

about your masculinity, it would be you. But your coworker is equally sure

that she’s the authority on these particular subjects.

You can discuss it; you can offer counterexamples, supporting evidence,

and notarized statements from your therapist or your dad or the pope. But

you can’t make her think something different about you. Maybe she will

and maybe she won’t.

The good news is that others aren’t actually spending as much time

thinking about you as you might imagine. Most people are simply too

obsessed with themselves to be obsessed with you. So while you’re sitting

at home trying to figure out how your ex-spouse could be so horribly wrong

about the kind of person you are, your ex-spouse is sitting at home

watching Luke on America’s Got Talent. Sure, she once called you a

pathetic excuse for a human being, and she may still think that. But she’s

not dwelling on the matter.3 And neither should you.

Have Compassion for Them

When someone levels an unfair attack at you or has spent a lifetime

withholding approval, compassion is not the first response that comes to

mind. And yet empathy can have a profound effect on how we see another

person and hear their feedback. When your dad yet again fails to register

any appreciation for an accomplishment that means a lot to you, remind

yourself what his dad must have been like. Better still, think about your dad

as the wounded little boy he must have been, and give that little boy a hug.

Speaking of little boys, when yours gets off the bus crying because a kid

called him stupid, don’t tell him he’s not. That’s just asking him to choose

between your story and the mean kid’s story. Help him find his own story in

which to stand. Help him think through the actual evidence, what might be

going on with the other kid, and what is actually true. If he can see for

himself that he’s not stupid, then he’ll see that someone else’s saying so

doesn’t make it so.

So don’t dismiss others’ views of you, but don’t accept them wholesale

either. Their views are input, not imprint.

WHEN LIFE COMES DOWN HARD

Okay, book, I’ve tried some of the things you’re talking about here,

and they’re not helping. I’m not just upset and worried. I’m depressed

and afraid—and it’s worse than you know.

Well put. Us too, sometimes.

DROWNING

If we were designing a human learning system from scratch, we might be

inclined to eliminate the most painful feelings. Let the toddler stumble and

the teenager fumble, but don’t let it hurt when they do. Your spouse leaves?

Do a quick exit interview to find out how you can improve, buy yourself a

killer pair of shoes, and head out on the town that very evening in search of

your next exciting partner.

Of course, we’re not built that way, not even close. And often enough we

wonder: Do these strong negative emotions serve any useful purpose in our

lives?

Sometimes they do. Emotional distress can send us under the covers for

weeks, but it can also cause us—force us—to reevaluate ourselves and our

lives in ways that we otherwise simply would not. Strong negative emotions

can keep us in a rut, but they can also help us break out of one. In fact, we

often learn the most from the feedback that in the moment is the most

distressing.

But for some of us, that distress turns into long-term anxiety or despair,

and we can become depressed, nonfunctioning, or suicidal. All those

distortions that Google our problems and make it appear that things will

never get better settle in for an extended stay. From the outside we look

fine, and so we get well-meaning advice from friends about maintaining a

good attitude, looking on the bright side, and staying active. But when we

are really struggling, that sort of counsel is as useless as yelling “just float!”

to someone who is drowning.

It is true that studies show that most people who experience trauma (for

example) come out the other end intact, and in fact, some percentage

experience post-traumatic growth. That should give people who have

experienced trauma a clear, empirical reason to be optimistic, and it tells the

rest of us that we need not be quite so fearful of the bad things that might

happen to us.

But if we’re not okay, then we’re not. Some combination of

predisposition and experience has broken us, and no matter how hard we

work to keep the feedback balanced and contained, it just isn’t helping.

When you are at your lowest, solace may come in the form of friends,

family, community, or God. You may find relief in medication, therapy, or

hospitalization. Exercise and meditation often do help, as does devoting

your time and energy toward something larger than yourself.

We are proponents of all of these.

ASK FOR SUPPORT

Often the first step is reaching out and asking for help. That takes humility

and courage. You might think those around you should know you’re having

trouble, but they may not. You might have to say the words: I need help. I

need you to be supportive right now.

Ask those around you to be supportive mirrors. They can see that you’re

still lovable, and that what you’re going through now isn’t the whole story

about you. They can see beyond the current pain to the place where things

will get better. Their picture of you is clear-eyed and balanced, not distorted

by the anxiety or shame or depression that clouds your own view.

Have faith in them. When that ex-spouse shows up at your door with an

unflattering portrait she painted of you, supportive mirrors will stop you

from hanging it over the fireplace in your living room. When your boss

recommends that you have the words “I’m incompetent” tattooed to your

forehead, they’ll gently steer you away from the tattoo parlor.

If you can’t find self-acceptance right now, get self-acceptance by proxy.

Allow your mirrors to cast your vote for you. And allow them to help you

find ways to make meaning out of the pain you’re experiencing by doing

something useful with it in the next chapter of your life. That’s the subject

of the next chapter of this book.

Summary: SOME KEY IDEAS

Before we can decide what we think of the feedback we get, we need to remove the

distortions:

Be prepared, be mindful — recognize your feedback footprint.

Separate the strands — of feeling / story / feedback.

Contain the story — what is this about and what isn’t it about?

Change your vantage point — to another, to the future, to the comedy.

Accept that you can’t control how others see you.

Don’t buy their story about you wholesale.

Others’ views of you are input, not imprint.

Reach out to supportive mirrors who can help you see yourself with compassion and

balance.

CULTIVATE A GROWTH IDENTITY

Sort Toward Coaching

In chapter 7, we looked at how our wiring affects how we react to both

positive and negative feedback, and how our emotional reactions affect our

ability to see the feedback clearly. Whether we’re elated or despairing, our

emotions can warp our perception of the feedback as surely as a fun house

mirror. In chapter 8, we talked about how to straighten out the feedback so

that you can understand it in perspective.

But even “actual size” feedback can destabilize our sense of ourselves.

Feedback can contradict or undermine the story we tell about who we are,

or it can confirm our worst fears about ourselves. Learning profitably from

feedback is not only about how we interpret the feedback; it’s also about

how we hold our identity. In this chapter we’ll examine how to build an

identity that is robust, not brittle, feedback friendly rather than feedback

averse.

FEEDBACK CAN ROCK OUR SENSE OF SELF

Visiting Mom in the facility was always heartbreaking. Saying good- bye at

the end of each visit and walking away as she watched on, sad and

confused, was almost more than you could bear.

After your mother’s dementia diagnosis, your dad cared for her, and you

helped out as much as possible. But as incontinence set in and the falls grew

more frequent, you found yourself lying awake nights sick with worry. The

toll on your father was becoming intolerable, and the risk of something

tragic happening only increasing. Eventually you helped talk your father

into putting your mom in a full-time care facility, for her safety as much as

for your dad’s sanity. It was the right thing to do. Wasn’t it?

Not according to your mother’s best friend, Rita, who told your father

that she will never speak to either of you again. When you hear this, you are

filled with shame.

IDENTITY: OUR SELF-STORY

Identity is the story we tell ourselves about ourselves—what we’re like,

what we stand for, what we’re good at, what we’re capable of. I’m a strong

leader; I’m an involved grandmother; I’m rational; I’m passionate; I’m

always fair.1 When feedback contradicts or challenges our identity, our story

about who we are can unravel.

You see yourself as smart, hardworking, and politically savvy. But

after ten years of focused pursuit, you’ve just been denied tenure. Now

who are you? And now what?

Nothing is more important to you than being a good son. Rita’s

condemnation slices through you like a white-hot knife, cutting deep

into your sense of self.

Your husband delivers an ultimatum—it’s me or the dog. You are

confused to realize you prefer the dog. Does that make you a bad

person?

It’s not just big, important feedback that can knock us sideways. The

everyday stuff can trip identity as well: Your best buddy gives his playoff

tickets to someone else. The customer you helped out for an hour yesterday

called back today and requested to speak to another representative. Even

positive feedback can be disorienting: You were comfortable with the image

of yourself as the “starving artist.” With the sudden acclaim for your latest

work, you wonder whether you’ve become a sellout.

We can even be triggered by information that isn’t about us. The girl you

used to work the register with at KFC was named head of NASA and your

nursery school nemesis just announced he’s taking his company public. You

feel happy enough for them, yet somehow worse about yourself. Because

identity stories are influenced by how we are doing relative to those around

us, our peers become the yardsticks we use to gauge how we measure up.2

IS YOUR IDENTITY BRITTLE OR ROBUST?

Imagine two people with similar natural abilities, life experiences, and brain

wiring. You might assume that their identities, and ability to absorb

feedback without losing balance, would be about the same.

And they might be. But not necessarily. Our ability to metabolize

challenging feedback is driven by the particular way we tell our identity

story. Some people tell their identity story in ways that cause their identity

to be brittle, while others tell their identity story in ways that allow it to be

robust. Those in the latter group are predisposed to treat feedback not as a

threat to who they are, but as a core aspect of who they are.

There is good news in this: While some of us do it naturally, we can all

learn to hold our identity in ways that make us more resilient. We can’t

control the feedback life throws at us, but we can make some specific shifts

in assumptions that can improve our ability to take it in, stay balanced, and

learn from it. Two shifts are crucial. We need to:

(1) Give up simple identity labels and cultivate complexity; and

(2) Move from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset.

We’ll look at each of these in turn, and then give you three practices that

can help you make these shifts amid the business and busyness of everyday

life.

GIVE UP SIMPLE LABELS AND CULTIVATE COMPLEXITY

While our identities are built from the endless complexity of our life

experiences, we tend to hold these identities as simple labels such as I’m

competent, I’m good, I’m worthy of love. These labels serve an important

function: Life can be messy and confusing, and simple identity labels

remind us of our values and priorities, of what we’re trying to live up to. If

I’m a man of my word, well, that settles it. I may be tempted to break my

commitment, and I can even justify doing so . . . but that’s not who I am.

Yet simple labels also present a problem. They are simple because they

are “all or nothing.” That works fine when we’re “all.” But when we get

feedback that we are not all, we hear it as feedback that we are nothing.

There’s no “partly all” or “sometimes all,” or “all, except for . . .” If we’re

not good, we’re bad; if we’re not smart, we’re stupid; if not a saint, then a

sinner.

No wonder feedback feels so threatening and we are so easily knocked

over. We’ve set ourselves up with identity stories that operate like a light

switch, and even minor feedback can flip that switch. If we’re not ablaze in

glory, we’re lost in the dark.

KEEP IT OUT OR LET IT IN?

When all-or-nothing identities bump up against negative feedback, they are

often overturned: The feedback becomes headline news in the latest issue of

The Daily Me: “Hardworking Academic” becomes “Fool Who Wasted

Years Chasing Tenure.” “Good Son” gets replaced by “Heartless Child Fails

Mother.” The feedback is the headline in our identity story, and all the other

things we know about ourselves get shoved to the back page. And in this

way, the feedback gets exaggerated.

In our struggle to cope, we spot the other choice: Keep the feedback out.

If we can figure out why the feedback is flawed or off base, if we can do

some skillful wrong spotting, then we can “deny” the feedback and preserve

our current sense of self. We’re safe. We’re still “all.” Our identity story

remains intact.

All-or-nothing identities present us with this choice: Either we can

exaggerate the feedback, or we can deny it. And often, we end up toggling

between the two. We shift back and forth between accepting and rejecting,

but find no stable place to land. (“If I accept this feedback, it means I’m a

bad person. Maybe I am. But that can’t be right. I’m going to reject this

feedback. But why would they say it if it weren’t true? Maybe it is right.

But I know myself better than they do, and if it were true, it would just be

too upsetting, so it can’t be true. On the other hand . . .”) And on we go,

flipping like a fish on the deck of a boat.

Neither choice feels right because neither choice is right. The answer

doesn’t lie in finding just the right way to jerry-rig the balance between

exaggeration and denial. The answer lies in how we hold our identity in the

first place.

EMBRACE IDENTITY NUANCE

So, while simple labels help orient us in the world, they don’t hold up well

against the complexity of the world. You’re a man of your word, but what if

your choice is between keeping your word to your supervisor and keeping

your word to your stepson? Or maybe you see yourself as “fair,” and fair is

fair, right? But what seemed fair last week suddenly seems less fair now

that you’ve talked to others who are affected by your choice.

So the simple labels are too black-and-white to be the whole story about

who you are. You are someone who cares deeply about being trustworthy or

fair or responsible, and there are a thousand examples of your being each of

these. And some examples of your falling short. That’s reality.

Your mom died about six months after the placement in the full-time care

facility, and you still struggle with whether the decision was the right one.

You had good reasons to suggest the move to your dad. At times you can’t

conceive of any other way it could have gone, while at others, you think it

was a grave moral lapse, the worst thing you’ve ever been involved in. In

your mind, you juxtapose images of your mom’s being there for you

throughout your life with her bewildered expression as you leave the

facility. Maybe you could have moved home to help, or brought your

mother to your place and hired a full-time nurse. People do that. Why didn’t

you?

Here’s the bottom line: As long as you tell your self-story in these black-

and-white terms, you will find no peace. You can’t choose between whether

you’re a good person or a bad person. Whichever you select, there is

evidence for the opposite conclusion.

It wasn’t a Disney movie. No fairy godmother or flock of bluebirds was

going to come along with stardust and wand-waving solutions. It was

complicated, and your feelings about it complicated. You were trying to

figure things out for your mom, and also trying to support your father. You

wanted your mother to be surrounded by love, but you also wanted her to be

safe and taken care of. You were trying to figure out how to do right for

each of your parents in the face of a hundred unknowns.

There are some things about how you handled the situation that you’re

proud of. You saw your mother almost every day. You made her photo

books about her life, filled with pictures of the early days—the ones she

could still remember. And there are some things you are less proud of—

opportunities missed, flashes of impatience. Your father probably didn’t get

enough of your time and attention. And certainly it took a toll on your own

family in those final months.

As your story of the situation and yourself becomes more nuanced, you

wonder whether there is something to learn in Rita’s view. You get up the

courage to call her, and she agrees to talk. She tells you how she feels, and

you understand. You tell her how you feel, and she doesn’t. Rita has some

implicit rules about these things—rules you probably shared yourself until

you’d been through the experience with your mother.

Rita insists your behavior was selfish, and that may be where you learn

the most. You don’t know if “selfish” is the right word, but self-interest was

certainly involved. By placing her in a facility, you no longer had to worry

about your mom’s falling; you didn’t have to clean up accidents, or worry

that she wasn’t eating enough. You didn’t have to be concerned about your

father collapsing from the stress of caretaking. The idea that self-interest

was involved in your decision clashes with a core part of your identity, to be

sure. You always saw yourself as someone who would do anything for those

you love. But now you recognize it’s not that simple.

With this acceptance comes sadness, but also a kind of balance.

THREE THINGS TO ACCEPT ABOUT YOURSELF

The sadness and the balance. That’s not unusual. There are things about

ourselves that are hard to accept, but when we do, we’re more grounded.

Tough feedback is less likely to knock us over; we can take it in as being at

least part of the story.

No one is perfect, and all things being equal, it’s better not to believe you

are—not just because it makes you less likable at parties, but also because it

makes it harder for you to learn from feedback. In Difficult Conversations

we offered three things to accept about yourself, and we include them here:

You will make mistakes, you have complex intentions, and you have

contributed to the problem. Accepting these is a lifelong project, but

working on them makes hard feedback easier to take in.

You Will Make Mistakes

If you have any doubts about this, just ask your spouse. In fact, your

particular spouse may be all the proof you need.

This is not the first you’ve heard that people make mistakes—even

brilliant, generous, otherwise awesome people. But it’s an easy truth to

forget when someone is pointing out a specific mistake we have made. If

you think that that would be precisely the easiest time to remember it, you’d

be mistaken. When a mistake is pointed out to us, our first instinct is to

defend ourselves or explain it away. Mistake? Not mine, not at all. I was

given the wrong date for that meeting, and anyway, I had decided I didn’t

need to attend.

Accepting the fact that you will make mistakes takes some of the

pressure off. Any given mistake may still have the capacity to shock and

dismay you, and the degree to which it highlights your blockheadedness is

unfortunate. But you can be confident that people make mistakes like these,

and that some of those people are you.

You Have Complex Intentions

This observation gets less airplay than the one about mistakes, although it’s

probably even harder to accept. Mixed in with our positive intentions are

less noble ones—we can be self-promoting, vengeful, shallow, vain, greedy.

We get tired and cut corners. We try not to lie, but forgive ourselves for

occasionally landing just shy of the full truth.

When we receive negative feedback about our intentions, without

exception we take exception. We had good intentions. We know we had

good intentions because that’s what good people have. We kept that

assignment for ourselves because we were the best person for it. The fact

that we’ve always wanted to go to Hawaii had nothing to do with it.

Pursuing a certain amount of self-interest is a requirement of being alive,

and occasionally that self-interest will conflict with someone else’s self-

interest, and occasionally that will be pointed out to you. It may be hard to

see or hard to admit. You shouldn’t stop striving to improve, but accepting

what “is” can be an enormous relief.

You Have Contributed to the Problem

It’s easy to do relationship math such that we are the wronged party in the

equation. And when we’re the wronged party, we don’t have to bother

listening to feedback. You e-mailed the wrong documents, and now

somehow you’ve got feedback for me? I don’t think so. When you attached

the wrong documents, you earned yourself a lifetime membership in my “I-

don’t-have-to-take-feedback-from-you-about-this-problem club.”

Of course, that math doesn’t usually add up. As we saw in chapter 6, in

most situations we’ve both contributed to the problem. We’ve each done or

failed to do things that got us into this mess. If we are going to learn from

the experience and address the problem, we have to look at the whole

picture. Which means we’ve got to close down the no-feedback club. Just

because we have feedback for them (“Send the right documents”) doesn’t

mean they don’t have feedback for us (“Don’t tell me ‘the attachments look

good’ if you haven’t even looked at them”).

Accepting that we’re not perfect also means giving up the idea that being

perfect is a viable way to escape negative feedback.3 It’s a seductive

thought, but it doesn’t work; you can’t behave your way out of ever

receiving feedback. You can’t outrun it, and you will collapse trying.

Accepting imperfection is not just a good idea, it’s the only choice.

YOU’VE BEEN COMPLICATED ALL ALONG

The first step, then, in keeping or regaining balance and improving your

odds of learning from feedback is to recognize that your identity label is a

simplification. You can more easily metabolize tough feedback when you

move away from the all-or-nothing instinct. You aren’t going from good to

bad, or even from good to complicated. You’ve been complicated all along.

SHIFT FROM A FIXED MINDSET TO A GROWTH MINDSET

Now that you’ve gotten out of the simple label business, let’s take a look at

another aspect of how you hold your identity: Do you consider your traits

and abilities fixed and finished? Or are they always evolving and capable of

growth?

Professor Carol Dweck of Stanford University says this distinction in

how we think about ourselves has important implications for our ability and

desire to learn from feedback. Where did she learn this? From kids.

PUZZLING KIDS

Dweck began her research with a simple question: How do kids cope with

failure? To find out, she brought children to her lab and had them engage

with progressively tougher puzzles. As the puzzles got more challenging,

the kids grew frustrated, disengaged, and finally gave up.

Except some didn’t. In fact, to Dweck’s surprise, a few of them became

more energized as the challenges increased. One boy licked his lips

excitedly as he tried first one approach and then another, saying, “I was

hoping this would be informative!” Dweck herself was puzzled and

somewhat amazed. What’s wrong with these kids? she wondered. Why

aren’t they giving up? Why aren’t they taking in the feedback from their

puzzle struggle and getting upset that they’re failing?4

Dweck talked with the children to find out how they were making sense

of things and concluded that the ones who gave up quicker thought along

these lines: The first puzzles showed I was smart. These new ones are

making me look (and feel) dumb. In contrast, the kids who persisted thought

this: These new harder puzzles are helping me get better at doing puzzles.

This is fun!

The reason some kids kept trying had nothing to do with their interest in

or aptitude for puzzles. It came from each child’s mindset. The kids who

stopped assumed their puzzle-solving skill was a fixed trait. They had a

certain amount of it, the way a water molecule has a certain number of

hydrogen atoms. The kids who kept going viewed their puzzle-solving

ability as a flexible trait that could change and grow.

FIXED VERSUS GROWTH ASSUMPTIONS

If you have a fixed mindset, every situation you encounter is a referendum

on whether you have the smarts or ability that you think (or hope) you have.

“Fixed” kids do fine when the puzzles are easy. But when they start to

struggle, they hear the puzzle whispering to them: Not enough puzzle

smarts. You are not up to this task. They become discouraged, impatient,

embarrassed. Better to quit than to continue to face what they lack.

In contrast, the kids with growth mindsets assume that puzzle smarts

aren’t something you either have or you don’t. They assume that it’s a skill

that can be developed, and moreover, they see struggling with a tough

puzzle as just the challenge they need to improve. As Dweck explains, “Not

only weren’t they discouraged by failure, they didn’t even think they were

failing. They thought they were learning.”5 For them, the puzzle is not an

evaluator, but a coach.

It’s as if the growth-mindset kids were doing the puzzles in a room called

the “Learning Room,” and the fixed-mindset kids were doing the puzzles in

a room called the “Testing Room.” Which room would you rather live your

life in?

Dweck observes that many of us believe that our core traits, assets, and

character—our identities—are “carved in stone.”6 The way we were talked

to as children (and the way we often talk to our own children) reinforces

this tendency: “He’s a born leader,” “She’s very bright,” “You’ve always

been a very kind person,” “You’re a natural athlete.” Our identity stories

calcify around what we have and what we don’t. And we buy into the

obvious implication: Effort is unlikely to move the dial. How we are

described is how we are, and the rating is permanent; it doesn’t come out in

the wash.

BUT AREN’T SOME TRAITS FIXED?

It’s reasonable to wonder: Isn’t the fixed mindset just an acknowledgment

of reality?

It’s true that some traits are less influenced by effort than others. Fish are

better than you at breathing underwater, and it’s not because of their can-do

attitude. And each of us finds that some things come more easily than

others: Math and running feel natural to you, drawing and patience still

don’t.

Researchers argue over the precise degree to which various traits are

fixed or elastic, and have offered both thrilling evidence of growth and

dispiriting stories of limitations. But the bottom line is this: People do get

better when they apply themselves, and people apply themselves when they

believe they can get better. This is true whether we are excruciatingly bad at

something or preternaturally good.

And effort matters most with the qualities in life that matter most—

things like intelligence, leadership, performance, confidence, compassion,

creativity, self-awareness, and collaboration. These all grow with attention

and improve with coaching.

IMPLICATIONS FOR HOW WE RESPOND TO FEEDBACK AND CHALLENGE

The fixed and growth assumptions we carry have profound implications for

how we see ourselves, how we hear the feedback we get, and how we

respond to it.

The Accuracy of Our Self-Perception

Part of learning and growing is having a decent handle on your current

capabilities. That tells you what strengths you might capitalize on and

nurture, as well as what weaknesses you need to work on or work around.

Dweck reports that those with growth mindsets are “amazingly accurate” in

gauging their current abilities, while people with fixed mindsets are

“terrible” at estimating their own proficiencies.7

Why might this be? If your traits are fixed, it should be easier to get an

accurate read on your abilities. After all, they’re not a moving target. But

it’s more complicated than that: Although your mindset may be fixed, the

daily incoming data about you can fluctuate wildly. Yesterday I was

brilliant; today, a dolt. Last week I was competent; this week I seem to be a

real screwup. It can be hard to match up this broad range of data with your

simple, fixed sense of yourself. It’s not surprising that you’d be confused.

If you’ve got a growth identity, it’s easier to understand the mixed data.

It’s information, not damnation. Instead of hearing Last week I was

competent; this week a screwup, you hear Last week I was on top of things;

this week I’m dropping balls. It’s not who you are, but something you did.

Growth identity folks aren’t thrown by the contradiction and are motivated

to seek accurate information in order to adjust and learn.

How We Listen to Feedback

Our mindset—and resulting identity stories—has a significant impact on

what we pay attention to and what we don’t. Researchers Jennifer Mangels

and Catherine Good brought both fixed- and growth-mindset

undergraduates into a brain lab at Columbia, where they were hooked up to

EEG monitors and then took a test that drew from general knowledge of

literature, history, music, and art. Each student was then told two things:

whether they got each question right or wrong, and the correct answers for

the questions they missed. The fixed-mindset students paid close attention

to whether they got each question right or wrong, but lost interest when

informed what the right answer was. The growth-mindset folks, in contrast,

listened closely to the right answers. They didn’t ignore the evaluation, but

they were also hungry for coaching—how they could do better the next

time. And indeed, when retested, the growth-mindset students outperformed

their fixed counterparts.8

How We Respond to Struggle Can Create Self-fulfilling Prophecies

This may help to explain why, in the wake of failure, those with growth

mindsets tend to bounce back sooner. They see a shortfall as an opportunity

to grow and redouble their efforts as a result. After a setback at school,

growth-identity kids said they planned to study more or study differently

the next time, while kids with fixed mindsets were more likely to say that

they “felt dumb, would study less the next time, and seriously consider

cheating.” Perhaps driven by humiliation, people with a fixed mindset are

also more likely to lie to others about their performance and withdraw after

failure. They give up earlier, letting setbacks become settling points.9

The Framing Matters

Although Dweck says that about half of us tend to have fixed-identity

assumptions, the way we tell the story matters.

In fact, a single sentence can nudge us in the right (or wrong) direction.

In another study, Dweck and colleagues had fifth graders work on an easy

puzzle. Upon successful completion, half the children were told: “Wow,

you’re really smart!” The other half were told: “Wow, you worked hard at

that puzzle!” Then both groups were asked what they would like to do next:

a harder puzzle or an easier one.

Guess which group opted for the challenge? You guessed it.

One thing to learn from this study is that praising our kids for their

intelligence is, surprisingly, counterproductive to their learning. We’re

better off extolling their effort if we’re hoping to encourage them to take on

new challenges.

But wait a minute, why does this work? By the numbers, about half of

those kids who were admired for working hard had fixed mindsets. And yet

they opted to take on the next challenge as readily as their growth-mindset

groupmates. Perhaps the reason is that praising effort rather than ability

doesn’t trigger their fixed-identity anxiety. Or perhaps it’s that working hard

is a trait they feel confident they can replicate; whatever happens with that

next puzzle, their hard-working-ness could shine. But the bottom line is that

by focusing on a trait that emphasized the learning process, these kids were

just as willing to take risks and take on a challenge.

MOVE TOWARD A GROWTH IDENTITY

So how do you prod yourself from fixed assumptions to growth? The first

step is to be aware of your own tendencies. Are you more inclined to live in

the Testing Room or the Learning Room? Do you experience challenges as

threats to your identity or as opportunities for growth? Is failure the end of

the game or just another play in an ongoing game?

Look at the chart below and think about which assumptions resonate

with you.10

If you’re confused about whether a particular trait or ability is capable of

growth, that’s okay, too. These aren’t easy questions. But just because the

answer is not a clear yes does not mean it’s a clear no. Try experimenting:

Set out to change a habit or improve one of your skills. Find a coach and get

your hands dirty. Force yourself to try things you aren’t good at, and when

you fall on your face, make a list of three ways you could do better next

time. Rinse and repeat, and see what happens.

For instance, after your experience with your mother and your

conversation with Rita, what have you learned that will change how you

handle a comparable situation with your father? How will your experience

influence what you teach and expect from your own children? If you can

see things you will work at, if you can see things you have learned and

might change the next time, then you’re on your way to holding your sense

of self as capable of growth and change. The experience teaches you rather

than labels you.

And through it all, remember that negative feedback is not a rebuke to

the growth-mindset assumption. A growth mindset is not without setbacks

and disappointments. You’d hoped you were farther along this learning

curve than you apparently are. Your payoff for effort is smaller than you’d

hoped it might be. A growth identity is not about whether you get terrific or

troubling feedback. It’s about how you hold whatever you get.

• • •

Let’s turn to three specific practices that can help you cultivate a growth

identity.

PRACTICE #1: SORT TOWARD COACHING

Some feedback is primarily evaluative (your grade, your blog ranking).

Other feedback is intended as coaching. The giver’s only purpose is to help

you learn or get better at something. But as we saw with our twin batters

Annie and Elsie in chapter 2, even feedback offered as pure coaching can

reasonably be heard as evaluation. Try it this way (coaching) contains the

implicit message So far, you haven’t been doing it as well as you might

(evaluation).

As feedback receivers, we are always sorting feedback into coaching and

evaluation bins. Your choice of bin makes a huge difference in your ability

to take in feedback productively. The reason is this: While identity is easily

triggered by evaluation, it is far less threatened by coaching. It’s almost like

getting a free pass. You can learn without enduring the arduous task of

reevaluating who you are.

Elsbeth is on break after finishing the first half of a three-hour

presentation. The client approaches her and comments that it’s going well,

but suggests she amp up the energy level.

Is this coaching or evaluation?

If Elsbeth takes it as coaching, she might think to herself, I should have

another cup of coffee and figure out how to make this next segment more

interactive. . . . If she takes it as evaluation, her identity is hooked: Am I

boring you and everyone else? People usually love my sessions! But maybe

I’m not up to an audience this senior. . . . Elsbeth is left struggling with her

self-image, unable to engage with coaching that might actually improve the

next part of her talk. Identity triggered, learning blocked.

Hear Coaching as Coaching

Sorting toward coaching is not always easy. But there’s one kind of

feedback that should not give us any trouble: feedback that is specifically

offered as coaching. In that case, everything lines up in favor of hearing it

as such. It’s what they intend, it’s what will be helpful.

Yet too often we get it wrong and still sort coaching into the evaluation

bin.

Your friend shows you a better route to the airport, but you hear it as

a judgment that you don’t know your way around the city.

Your unit head tells you about a new app for time management, but

you hear him criticizing you for procrastinating.

Your partner tells you what she finds romantic, but you hear her

saying you are clueless and self-absorbed.

We snatch defensiveness from the jaws of learning.

As feedback conversations get more emotional or the stakes grow higher,

it gets easier to hear evaluation, and tougher to hear the coaching.

Try this exercise: Think of feedback you’ve received in the past several

months, big or small. Say, for example, that your friend asked you why you

let your children stay up so late.

First assume that the feedback was intended as evaluation. What would

the feedback say about you? You’re overpermissive? A bad parent?

Now imagine that the feedback was intended as coaching—something

you might learn from. In that case, you’d probably have a conversation with

your friend about what they’ve noticed and what they’re concerned about. It

might be something you’ve already considered or something you haven’t.

It’s another set of life experiences for you to consider when you make

parenting choices.

If you run through this sorting exercise a few times, you’ll notice three

things. First, you’ll see that with some effort you can hear most feedback

either way. Second, if you’re successful in hearing it as coaching, you’ll

notice that your identity reaction is diminished or gone. And third, you’ll

start to notice patterns—your own tendencies. Not uncommonly people

have this insight: Wow, I oversort toward evaluation way more than I

realized. Whether you do that only one out of ten times or eight out of ten

times, each of those oversorts is a potential meltdown that didn’t need to

happen, and feedback you could have been learning from. There are enough

real challenges in life. You don’t need to create imaginary ones.

When Coaching and Evaluation Get Tangled

Of course, sometimes the person giving the feedback intends a mix of

evaluation and coaching, or, more commonly, just hasn’t thought about it

clearly. In intense personal relationships this can be especially confusing,

and it takes real effort to sort things out.

A grown daughter, Lisa, tells her mother, Margaret: “When I was eight

and Dad left, I felt like you had abandoned me, too. You were so consumed

with your new job and your new social life—with ‘finding me a new dad.’ I

don’t think you realized how hard it was for me.”

Margaret hears Lisa saying, “You were a bad mother,” and is devastated.

She feels the feedback is unfair and defends herself: “Lisa, I worked so

hard to make things okay for you. It was a terribly hard time for both of us,

and I was really struggling emotionally and financially.”

This conversation is a good example of how identity and feedback

collide and of the fallout that results. Margaret sees herself as a good parent

—it’s a core theme in her identity story. She hears Lisa saying that she was

a failure as a mother, and is thrown into the dilemma of either accepting

what her daughter is saying (and seeing herself as a failure) or arguing with

Lisa’s characterization in an attempt to keep the feedback out.

It’s important to ask: What does Lisa want? What is her purpose in

bringing the subject up? Does she want her mother to admit she was a bad

mother? No. Lisa is hoping for three things: She wants her mother to

understand how she felt growing up; she wants acknowledgment from her

mother that some of her mother’s choices contributed to Lisa’s pain; and

she wants a better current relationship.

Clearly, there is evaluation and judgment here, and anyone in Margaret’s

position would hear it. But the core of what Lisa is trying to communicate is

coaching. Her goal is not for her mother to feel judged, but for her mother

to learn about Lisa’s views and feelings. And in time, Lisa wants an

improved relationship with her mother.

We can test the assertion that Lisa intends coaching by looking at

different ways Margaret might respond and imagining which would be most

satisfying to Lisa. If her mother says, “Okay, maybe I was a bad mother,”

that is unlikely to do Lisa much good. In contrast, Margaret might say,

“Wow, I never realized how I was affecting you during that time. It’s hard

for me to hear that I was doing things that were hurtful to you. I’m so

sorry.” Of course, this will be a longer conversation, but likely to be more

satisfying to Lisa. And at some point they can begin to discuss how they’d

like their relationship to be now.

Placing the conversation in a coaching frame may help lessen Margaret’s

emotional pain, but that’s not the reason it’s important to do. Margaret

should hear it as coaching because it’s at the heart of what her daughter

intends. Hearing coaching helps Margaret to move away from her own

internal identity reaction and work to hear what her daughter is really

saying.

PRACTICE #2: UNPACK JUDGMENT FROM THE EVALUATION SUITCASE

Some feedback, of course, is straight evaluation, and it’s this that challenges

our identity most directly. I’m breaking up with you; you didn’t get the job;

the neighbors won’t let their kid play at your house because they disapprove

of your “home environment.”

As we figure out how to hear evaluation, it’s helpful to break evaluation

itself down into three constituent parts: assessment, consequences, and

judgment.

Assessment ranks you. It tells you where you stand. At the track

meet your assessment is clear: You ran the mile in five minutes,

nineteen seconds, placing you fourth in the forty- to forty-five age

group.

Consequences are about the real-world outcomes that result from

the assessment: Based on the assessment, what, if anything, is going to

happen? As a result of your race time, you qualify for the regionals,

but do not yet qualify for the nationals. Consequences can be certain

or speculative, immediate or down the road.

Judgment is the story givers and receivers tell about the assessment

and its consequences. You are delighted by your performance—it’s

better than you expected this morning. Your coach is disappointed by

your performance and thinks you should have done better.

By looking at the components of evaluation this way, you can figure out

what about a given evaluation is triggering your identity. In the racing

example, it’s not the assessment or the consequences; it’s your coach’s

judgment. You see yourself as someone who doesn’t let others down.

Learning that your coach is disappointed challenges that aspect of how you

see yourself. Not in a huge way, but it’s something you notice.

Breaking it down also helps you focus on what you want to discuss with

the feedback giver: Are you in agreement with the assessment but not the

judgment?11 Are the consequences clear and fair? Why does your coach

have a different judgment about your time, and what can you learn from

that?

Accurate assessment is valuable and the consequences are important to

understand. Others’ judgments? You may find certain judgments

illuminating; other judgments you’ll rightly dismiss. It’s one person’s

interpretation, and you’ve got your own interpretation, thank you very

much.

PRACTICE #3: GIVE YOURSELF A “SECOND SCORE”

Let’s imagine you get a negative evaluation. The assessment seems fair, but

the consequences are painful. You get rejected—by that potential employer,

that girl, that graduate program, that team, that client.

Now what?

Whatever else you do to cope, imagine that there is an invisible second

evaluation. After every low score you receive, after each failure and

faltering step, give yourself a “second score” based on how you handle the

first score. In every situation in life, there’s the situation itself, and then

there’s how you handle it. Even when you get an F for the situation itself,

you can still earn an A+ for how you deal with it.

There are two pieces of good news here. First, while the initial evaluation

may not be fully within your control, your reaction to it usually is. And

second, in the long term, the second score is often more important than the

first.

Mel and Melinda, two aspiring performers, work hard on their first

YouTube video, which they hope will be their ticket out of the mundane

world of their day jobs. They write it, direct it, act in it, and edit it. They

compose and perform the music. The final product exceeds their

expectations. It’s brilliant. They post it.

It gets savaged. The comments are uniformly thumbs down, and several

are needlessly personal and cruel. And it’s getting a paltry number of hits.

Mel is crushed, angrily accusing the world of being too stupid to

understand what he and Melinda are trying for. Melinda is just as upset, but

as she licks her wounds, she wonders what they can learn from the

experience.

A few weeks later Melinda watches the video and notices for the first

time that, although the ideas are clever, the execution has problems. The

lyrics are hard to make out, the jump cuts are too jumpy. She shares her

observations with Mel, who responds that creative people would be able to

see past the problematic execution.

Melinda has a different response: She’s determined to get good—scary

good—at the craft of making these short movies. She reads everything she

can find on social media and takes an evening class on film editing. Over

the course of the next year she develops and posts several new videos and

starts to pick up subscribers to her channel. Eventually she reworks the

original video and posts it to a mostly thumbs-up reception.

Both Mel and Melinda got a thumbs-down first score; only Melinda got a

thumbs-up second score. In this example, as is so often the case, a good

second score is what really matters.

To be clear, we’re not just saying that it’s good to be resourceful and

resilient. We’re suggesting that you make getting a good second score part

of your identity: I don’t always succeed, but I take an honest shot at

figuring out what there is to learn from the failure. I’m actually pretty good

at that. You might even have a kind of Second Score Scorecard set up in

your mind. That will make this particular part of your identity easier to keep

track of. The scorecard reminds you that the initial evaluation is not the end

of the story. It’s the start of the second story about the meaning you’ll make

of the experience in your life.

A strong second-score identity can help you deal with even the most

challenging life events. Heather recalls the day her longtime girlfriend left

her, and the weeks and months that followed: “All I had control over was

my reaction, and I got up every morning and went to work. I treated

everyone around me respectfully. Actually, working to ‘handle it well’ gave

me something to focus on and to feel good about. And I do.”

As we mentioned in the previous chapter, handling something well

doesn’t mean denying pain or that you emerge unscathed. Heather isn’t

saying, “Now that my girlfriend has left me, I’m happier than ever!” It’s

about facing whatever you’re dealing with head-on. If you find yourself

unable to sleep and fighting bouts of anxiety and loneliness, then handling it

well means having the courage to admit that you need help and asking for

it. Even as Heather’s identity as someone who is worthy of love took a hard

hit, she found growth: “I learned that I could deal with a tough loss with

grace and resilience.”

That’s not nothing.

Summary: SOME KEY IDEAS

Our ability to take in and metabolize feedback is affected by how we tell our identity story.

Shift from:

Simple all-or-nothing to realistically complex.

Fixed to growth — so that you see challenge as opportunity, and

feedback as useful information for learning.

Three practices help:

1. Sort for coaching. Hear coaching as coaching, and find the coaching in

evaluation.

2. When evaluated, separate the judgment from assessment and

consequences.

3. Give yourself a second score for how you handle the first score.

FEEDBACK IN CONVERSATION

HOW GOOD DO I HAVE TO BE?

Draw Boundaries When Enough Is Enough

Martin started in the oil business straight out of the Marines, working his

way up on the rig. He is now considered one of the best drillers in the

business. After a long shift, Martin crawls into his bunk and pulls out his

unfinished development plan. It’s overdue. He needs to send it shoreside

tonight or risk an escalated round of pestering.

Item 23b: Please list your personal goals for the coming year. Include

benchmarks for how you will measure your attainment of those goals.

Martin groans. After thirty-one years in the business, I need yet another

round of hungry new goals? He smiles and writes: “My goal is to complete

another year safely and productively. And to get you to leave me alone

about my goals.”

No benchmarks necessary.

FINDING BOUNDARIES, SETTING BOUNDARIES

Most of this book explores how to get better at receiving feedback—taking

it in and understanding it fully before deciding whether to accept it. But this

raises a question: Is it okay not only to turn down feedback, but to say, “I

don’t even want to hear it”?

It is.

In fact, being able to establish limits on the feedback you get is crucial to

your well-being and the health of your relationships. Being able to say no is

not a skill that runs parallel to the skill of receiving feedback well; it’s right

at the heart of it. If you can’t say no, then your yeses are not freely chosen.

Your decision may affect others and it will often have consequences for

you, but the choice belongs to you. You need to make your own mistakes

and find your own learning curve. Sometimes that means you need to shut

out the critics for a while so you can discover who you are and how you are

going to grow. Writer Anne Lamott puts it this way:

. . . Every single one of us at birth is given an emotional acre all our

own. You get one, your awful Uncle Phil gets one, I get one. . . . And

as long as you don’t hurt anyone, you really get to do with your acre

as you please. You can plant fruit trees or flowers or alphabetized

rows of vegetables, or nothing at all. If you want your acre to look like

a giant garage sale, or an auto-wrecking yard, that’s what you get to

do with it. There’s a fence around your acre, though, with a gate, and

if people keep coming onto your land and sliming it or trying to do

what they think is right, you get to ask them to leave. And they have to

go, because this is your acre.1

This chapter is about that acre, fence, and gate, and how and why you might

ask your givers to step outside on occasion.

THREE BOUNDARIES

Rejecting feedback can be as easy as saying no thanks or walking away or

simply saying nothing. They offer, you decline, and it’s over. But

sometimes it’s more complicated than that. You say no, but the unwanted

feedback keeps coming. It’s not just bothersome but destructive. This is

when it helps to be explicit about boundaries. Here are three kinds of

boundaries to consider:

1. I MAY NOT TAKE YOUR ADVICE

The first is the softest: I’m willing to listen. I’ll consider your input. But I

may not end up taking it.

Is this any fence at all? If the choice is always yours, why would you

need to describe this first boundary out loud? Because the person giving

you the feedback or advice may not share your opinion that it’s optional.

You ask your future mother-in-law to suggest florists for the wedding. You

choose a different florist, and she gripes: “Why do you even ask my advice

if you don’t care what I say?” In the dance between receiver and giver,

when you don’t follow the giver’s lead, you may step on some toes.

It can be confusing terrain. If you reject my advice, are you rejecting me?

Some advice givers hear it that way, even if it doesn’t mean that to you.

When you solicit suggestions you know you may not take, you can avoid

heartache by saying so up front. Don’t say to your mother-in-law: “Which

florist should we use?” Be more precise: “We’re thinking about several

different florists. Are there any you’d add to our list?”

Another challenge is the line between a suggestion and an order.

Choosing to disregard feedback may have consequences. You can continue

to turn up late for your shift at the hospital . . . and your boss can fire you. If

you’re unsure if the coaching is optional or mandatory, discuss it explicitly.

And if you decide not to take the coaching, don’t assume the giver knows

why. Explain your reasons carefully.

2. I DON’T WANT FEEDBACK ABOUT THAT SUBJECT, NOT RIGHT NOW

With this second boundary, you are not only establishing your right to

decide whether to take the feedback, you’re establishing your right to be

free of the topic altogether: “I don’t even want to hear it. Not right now (and

maybe not ever).”

Your sister has badgered you to quit smoking for years. You’ve tried and

failed and tried and failed. Now that your uncle is dying of a smoking-

related illness, the whole family has joined the chorus. You understand

where they’re coming from, but right now you need them to back off. There

just isn’t anything more to say on the subject, and you don’t have the

emotional energy to continue the conversation.

3. STOP, OR I WILL LEAVE THE RELATIONSHIP

This third boundary is the starkest: If you can’t keep your judgments to

yourself, if you can’t accept me the way I am now, then I will leave the

relationship, or change its terms (I will come home for the holidays, but I’m

not staying with you). Simply being in the relationship, buffeted by your

judgments, is doing damage to my sense of self.

HOW DO I KNOW IF BOUNDARIES ARE NEEDED?

It starts with an agitated feeling or thought: I’m overwhelmed; I’m a failure;

this isn’t working; this is too much; I can never do anything right; I’m not

good enough. And then a question: Should I draw a boundary here? But

how can you tell the difference between someone who is genuinely trying to

help you (or trying to share a real concern about how you are in a

relationship) and a relationship that is in some fundamental way out of

whack or unhealthy?

There is no pat formula for determining the difference between a

legitimate request for change and one that indicates a deeper problem. The

feedback giver may not mean harm, may not be trying to control you, and

may even care deeply about you. They may not know any better, or may

have issues of their own. But that doesn’t change the feedback’s impact on

you, as it eats away at your self-acceptance bit by bit.

Below are a set of questions that will help you sort out your own thinking

about whether a boundary is needed in a particular context or relationship.

DO THEY ATTACK YOUR CHARACTER, NOT JUST YOUR BEHAVIOR?

They don’t say, “I found that frustrating,” or, “Here’s an idea that would

help.” Instead they say, “Here’s what’s wrong with you,” or even, “Here’s

why you’ll never amount to anything.” Whether or not it’s explicitly

spoken, the message is that you are not attractive or ambitious or good

enough, you are not worthy of love, respect, and kindness the way you are

now.

IS THE FEEDBACK UNRELENTING?

Your executive coach is trying to help you feel more comfortable

hobnobbing with the bigwigs in the C-suite, but he is making you more

self-conscious and anxious, not less. You’ve discussed the fact that it’s not

helping, but instead of adjusting his approach, your coach opens the spigot

wider.

Unhelpful feedback is useless; relentless unhelpful feedback is

destructive. You’ve asked the person to stop, cease, desist, shut up, go

away. Yet the coaching and advice pour forth.

WHEN YOU DO CHANGE, IS THERE ALWAYS ONE MORE DEMAND?

Some feedback givers are always looking for the next thing to fix, whether

it’s about the house or the car or you. But more ominously, it may be that

the act of telling you what to change is the end in itself. They are in charge,

you are their charge, and those clear roles keep things in order.

This need for control could be motivated by their own fear: If your

partner didn’t always have you scrambling to be worthy of their love, you’d

notice there was nothing in the relationship for you. If your supervisor

didn’t withhold his respect, you’d realize that he’s not particularly worthy

of your respect. Or maybe they need to feel in charge because they just

don’t know how to play any other role. Whatever the cause, the effect

leaves you in a constant state of not good enough.

DOES THE FEEDBACK GIVER TAKE THE RELATIONSHIP HOSTAGE?

The formulation here is this: Of course it’s your choice whether or not to

take my feedback, but if you don’t, it means you don’t love or respect me.

They tie something small to something big, which is a ploy to get their way

on every small issue that comes along. This tactic strips you of your

autonomy while pretending you’re free to do as you please.

Your mother-in-law conveys an implicit message: If you don’t choose the

florist I recommended, you’re the one who ruined our relationship. It

sounds ludicrous because it is. But it’s worth being aware that the intention

behind this approach is not always manipulative. People sometimes seek

attention by holding the relationship hostage because they don’t have the

skills to express their feelings of insecurity, anxiety, or hurt in any other

way. You can be compassionate about the giver’s needs without becoming

their hostage.

ARE THEY ISSUING WARNINGS—OR MAKING THREATS?

Here’s the difference: A warning is a good-faith attempt to explain possible

legitimate consequences (“If you’re late to dinner, the spaghetti will be

cold”), whereas the purpose of a threat is to manufacture consequences that

will induce fear (“If you’re late to dinner, I will throw the spaghetti at

you”). These are warnings:

“If your people management skills don’t improve, we can’t keep you in

this position.”

“If you don’t disclose this in the filing, I’m required to inform the

commission.”

“If you come home drunk again, I’m moving out.”

As you can see, the variable is not whether the consequences warned of are

severe; it’s whether they are legitimate. In some cases, the warnings are

final; they’re ultimatums. It is not a happy situation that things have come

to this. But the other person is giving you information about real

consequences so that you can make informed choices.

Threats have the same “if-then” structure, but spring from a different

motive: to induce fear or dependence, to lower self-esteem or confidence, to

control or manipulate. And the consequences are manufactured for that

purpose:

“If you don’t do as I say, I’ll see that you never work in this industry

again.”

“If I leave you, no one else will ever love you.”

A warning is when someone tells you the other shoe may drop; a threat is

when they make sure it will squash you.

IS IT ALWAYS YOU WHO HAS TO CHANGE?

Things seem okay until you notice a troubling pattern. Whenever there is

conflict between you, whenever you need to solve a problem that has

arisen, you are the only one who takes responsibility for anything. You

apologize, you stay late, you absorb the budget overruns. If you are always

the one who has to change, who has to give in, who has to go the extra mile,

then your roles may be stuck. Negotiating a shift from blame and one-way

feedback to mutual accountability and willingness to look at the system

between you is fundamental to the sustainability of a relationship, whether

it’s based in work, love, or friendship.

ARE YOUR VIEWS AND FEELINGS A LEGITIMATE PART OF THE RELATIONSHIP?

This may be both the simplest and most important of the criteria.

Regardless of anything else, is the feedback giver listening to you and

working hard to understand how you see things and how you feel? And

once they know, do they care? Are they willing to modify how they share

their feedback, requests, and advice based on how it affects you? Do they

respect your autonomy to make up your own mind and to reject their

advice? If your feelings and views aren’t part of the relationship, there is a

problem.

WHERE BOUNDARIES WOULD HELP: SOME COMMON

RELATIONSHIP PATTERNS

The relationship doesn’t have to be certifiably dysfunctional for you to

decide that feedback within the relationship is not working for you. Let’s

look at three examples of how the challenges described above form

common relationship patterns.

THE CONSTANT CRITIC

Constant critics provide running commentary that is a stream of evaluation

—sizing you up and letting you know the score. They are your father, your

older sister, your best friend, your devoted coach, your demanding boss.

They just want to help. And they do this with all the subtlety of an

auctioneer.

Conversations between Hunyee and her mother have always been

fraught. As a child Hunyee was relentlessly corrected, coached, and

chastised. As an adult she knows that the minute her mother arrives she will

begin assessing the state of Hunyee’s closets, cooking, weight, and

wardrobe. Hunyee knows that her mother loves her, and even recognizes

that her constant criticism is the way her mother expresses that love. In fact,

it’s the way her mother expresses everything; without criticism, there would

be only silence.

But it still leaves Hunyee feeling raw and hurt. Even in her mother’s

absence, Hunyee hears her voice in her head, goading and condemning.

This is not the legacy her mother intends, but without some change, it is the

one she will inevitably leave.

There are constant critics at work as well. Jake, a successful investment

adviser, prides himself on his mentoring relationship with Brodie, a young

analyst. Jake’s standards are uncompromising, but he’s lavish with coaching

and advice, rare commodities at this particular firm. Unfortunately, this is

not how Brodie sees it. He feels like he can do no right. Every move he

makes is criticized, every report is ripped apart, every effort inadequate.

Brodie, a pretty tough character himself, now dreads coming to work.

HATE-LOVE-HATE RELATIONSHIPS

Psychologists tell us that the most addictive reward pattern is called

“intermittent reinforcement.” Video games and gambling use this approach.

We win just often enough to keep us playing. When we do win, we’re

desperate to win again; when we lose, we are even more desperate to play

until we win. Winning love and approval may be the reward we crave most.

Jasmine is caught in a relationship in which approval is dangled and

promised but withheld. Just when all seems lost, approval is briefly

bestowed—and then withdrawn again, starting the cycle afresh. This is one

important reason why someone might stay with a damaging partner, coach,

boss, or family member. They hate the hate, but it makes their need for the

love even more intense. Feedback giver and receiver are both caught up in a

powerful dynamic that is not healthy for either and is particularly damaging

to the receiver.

RENOVATION RELATIONSHIPS

Henry was thrilled by all the attention Isabella paid him. Even her little

“suggestions” had an intoxicating effect; they were, after all, evidence of

how much she cared about him. He’d found love, and all this self-

improvement was a bonus.

Until it wasn’t. At first her suggestions for change seemed reasonable.

She had ideas for how he could “freshen up his look,” and he figured it

wouldn’t hurt to be a sharper dresser. But then the feedback spread to other

aspects of his life: work out more, stop reading those comics, don’t act like

such a nerd in front of my friends, don’t take things so personally, have

some ambition, make my hobbies your hobbies.

Henry tried. He was genuinely eager to be the person Isabella wanted

him to be. But in time he grew anxious and unhappy and told Isabella so.

She explained that she was just trying to help him grow, noting that Henry

wasn’t making it easy since he was so hypersensitive to feedback.

Henry decided to get some outside perspective and discussed the

relationship with his friend Rollo:

Henry: I mean, maybe she’s right. Maybe I am too sensitive. If I’m

going to be in a serious relationship maybe I have to be more

mature myself. Maybe I really do need to change. Maybe I’m being

selfish or maybe I’m kind of stuck.

Rollo: That’s possible. But what I’m struck by is how unhappy you

are. Have you told Isabella how all her advice and criticism is

affecting you?

Henry: Yeah, I’ve told her. Several times.

Rollo: How does she respond?

Henry: She said the real problem is that I’m just too sensitive to

feedback.

Rollo: And you were honest about just how unhappy you are?

Henry: I was. The whole thing is really eating away at me and I’ve

told her that.

Rollo: To me, that’s the big problem here. From what you’ve said, it

sounds as if she’s trying to turn you into someone else. But even

putting that aside, it sounds like your feelings are not part of the

equation, and what you need is not part of the relationship.

Henry: Hmm. So you’re saying that regardless of whether she’s too

critical or I’m too sensitive, it’s a problem that she doesn’t seem to

care how I’m feeling.

Rollo: It’s a giant red flag.

Henry has become so preoccupied by whether he is able to please Isabella

that he isn’t noticing just how little his needs and feelings matter to her.

Keep this front and center: No matter what growing you have to do, and

regardless of how right (or not) the feedback may be, if the person giving

you the feedback is not listening to you and doesn’t care about its impact on

you, something is wrong. Rollo has this exactly right. It’s fine to try to

figure out whether the giver is too critical or you’re too sensitive, but if the

other person isn’t listening to you and your feelings, the answer is beside

the point. You are worthy of love, acceptance, and compassion—right now,

as you are, full stop. This may be tough to see from inside an unbalanced

relationship. But it’s the bottom-line truth.

BUT WAIT, DOES THAT MEAN . . . ?

Is there something wrong with hoping your significant other does pick up

some better habits, loses some weight, or finally finishes college? No. It’s

fine to wish that for them, and to coach and support them so they can get

there. The key question here: Is it something they want? Or something only

you want? If they genuinely do want this change, you’re in the clear. Make

your intentions discussable, and most of all, make sure to listen.

TURNING AWAY FEEDBACK WITH GRACE AND HONESTY

The biggest mistake we make when trying to create boundaries is that we

assume other people understand what’s going on with us. Surely they know

we’re overloaded or unhappy or struggling, and that their feedback is

making things worse. But often they don’t. We may not have told them, or

if we have, we were indirect or unclear or they just weren’t listening. It’s

true that they haven’t exactly gone out of their way to figure us out, but

that’s not within our control, and frankly, it’s par for the course. They’ll

never be as interested in figuring out our boundaries as we are.

BE TRANSPARENT: ACTUALLY TELL THEM

With increasing frequency, Dave, a cop in his mid-forties, asks people to

repeat themselves and misses what is said in meetings. His coworkers have

started to notice. “My partner kept nudging me to get my hearing checked,

so I finally did,” says Dave. “Turns out my hearing has really deteriorated,

and I need a hearing aid.”

Yet six months have passed, and Dave hasn’t gone back to be fitted for

one. “I’ve been wrestling a bit,” he admits. “I’m having trouble thinking of

myself as someone who needs a device that, fairly or unfairly, I’ve always

associated with the elderly. I know my resistance isn’t rational. I’ll get

there. I just need time to update my self-image.”

Dave hasn’t told anyone on the force about the test or the result. He

doesn’t feel that he needs to: What matters is that he’s on top of things and

is dealing with it.

But his coworkers don’t know that. So they’re left with the impression

that he’s ignoring them. When they repeat their concerns, Dave responds to

them—in his head. It’s being handled, he thinks to himself, so why do you

keep bothering me about it?

All he needs to do is explain things out loud: “I got checked. I need a

hearing aid. I’m going to get one. It’s a hard adjustment to make. I’ll do

better if I’m not pestered.” That won’t fix his hearing problems, but it will

go a long way toward fixing his feedback problems.

BE FIRM—AND APPRECIATIVE

Dave’s story is an example of someone taking feedback. It’s at least as

important to be explicit and clear when we reject feedback. We can do that

best by being both firm and appreciative.

PJ struggles with severe stage fright, and her university department head

has a habit of rushing up to her just as she is about to begin lecturing and

whispering, “Don’t be nervous!” Which makes PJ panic. But she handles

the feedback conversation well:

PJ: Anxiety is a real struggle for me. I know you’re aware of that, and

when you say “don’t be nervous” I know you’re trying to help. The

impact, though, is it actually makes me more nervous, rather than

less.

Department Head: Well, of course I’m trying to help. Anything to

give you that extra boost of confidence! So when you get up there,

there’s no need to be nervous!

PJ: Okay, but that does end up making me more nervous.

Department Head: Well, it shouldn’t. You’re fabulous!

PJ: Here’s the impact it has on me. It reminds me that I have this

anxiety problem. What would help me is to hear how you’ve been

able to cope with anxiety when you speak publicly. But I’d like to

hear about that on days when I’m not lecturing.

PJ does a graceful job of acknowledging and appreciating her department

head’s good intentions, while being firm in her request that she not get

coaching right before she lectures. Being firm and being appreciative are

not opposite ends of a continuum. You can be clear about both.

REDIRECT UNHELPFUL COACHING

Sometimes we assume we need the starkest kind of boundary because of the

pain we’re in. Our instinct is to shut it all down: No judgment. No coaching.

No nothing—or it’s good-bye.

But you may have noticed that PJ does something that can make drawing

boundaries easier: She redirects her coach’s energy and interest toward

something that may actually help.

You might experiment with loaning your giver a corner of your acre, and

tell them what you’d love to see there. Hunyee to her mother: “I have so

much to learn from you. When you visit, would you teach me to make your

amazing dumplings?” This suggestion is good for Hunyee, of course, but it

might meet her mother’s interests as well. Her mother yearns for a role in

her daughter’s life, and her criticisms may be a misguided attempt to

establish such a role. She wants to be useful and to feel valued by her very

capable adult child.

Letting givers know what they can help you with may be the incentive

they need to cut down on the advice you don’t want to hear about. And it

lays a helpful foundation for erecting other boundaries if you need them.

USE “AND”

In setting up boundaries, you want to reject feedback clearly and firmly,

while at the same time affirming the relationship and showing that you

appreciate the intention.

The temptation is to link these two thoughts with the word “but.” Hunyee

to her mother: “I love seeing you, but if you’re going to come to my house

you need to stop criticizing every single thing.” “But” suggests a

contradiction between the two thoughts. The first part would be true, but for

the second. You love seeing me but what? “But you criticize me too much.”

So therefore you don’t actually love seeing me.

Human emotions don’t necessarily cancel each other out. I can love

spending time with you and still be anxious that you’re coming. I can

genuinely appreciate your mentoring and decide not to take your advice. I

can be sad that I’m hurting you and proud of myself for doing the right

thing. Contradictory feelings sit side-by-side in our hearts and minds,

clacking against each other like marbles in our pocket.

Using “and” to describe our feelings isn’t just about word choice. It gets

at a deeper truth about our thoughts and feelings: They are often complex

and sometimes confused. We figure we can draw clear boundaries most

easily with a simple bottom-line message—yes, no, not right now—and so

our impulse is to keep the complexity or confusion hidden. But often

sharing complex feelings along with the message actually makes

establishing the boundary easier.

Raul’s parents believe that an engineering degree will give their son a

secure life, without the hardships they have endured. His passion for music?

A “frivolous hobby.”

Raul respects his parents and has worked hard to understand their

perspective and worries. He shares many of those worries himself,

profoundly so. And still, he has decided to pursue music. But how to tell his

parents? “When I tried to imagine having the conversation,” he says, “my

blood ran cold. Rejecting their advice would mean turning my back on

them; following their advice would mean turning my back on myself. I

don’t want to be the ungrateful, wayward son. And I don’t want to be an

engineer.”

Nothing was going to make this conversation easy, and Raul couldn’t

control how his parents would react. What unlocked the dilemma for Raul

was realizing that he could share both sides of the “and”—the multiple,

competing, and confusing thoughts and feelings that are no less true for

being simultaneous. With his heart in his throat, Raul sat down with his

parents and held forth with a series of ands: “I’ve been afraid to talk to you

about this and it’s important to me to be honest with you.” “I’ve decided to

major in music and I know this makes you worry about my future.” “I’m

also very fearful of the struggle I may face and I need to try.” “I know this

is hard for you and I hope you will still be supportive of me.”

He braced for their reaction. If this were a Hollywood movie, his parents

would have smiled and offered a cheerful embrace. But there was no

swelling soundtrack. In his father’s face there was disappointment, in his

mother’s there was worry. Raul himself was anxious—but at peace with

himself. He’d made a hard decision that felt right to him and had explained

it to his parents as clearly and respectfully as he knew how.

When you share the complexity or confusion, you are adopting what we

call the “And Stance.” It’s a powerful place to stand, and you can use it in

any situation where you’ve listened to someone’s input and have decided to

go in a different direction: “I think what you’ve said makes a lot of sense.

And I’ve decided that those aren’t the skills that are the most pressing

priority for me right now.” Fill in your reasoning and be willing to field

questions to make it a two-way conversation. It’s your boundary, but the

conversation belongs to both of you.

BE SPECIFIC ABOUT YOUR REQUEST

Hunyee ultimately says this to her mother: “Mom, I love you and I know

you want the best for me. And your comments about my weight and

housekeeping and clothing are incredibly upsetting to me. If you’re going to

stay with me, I need you to keep them to yourself. Is that a request you can

honor?”

Hunyee is making a specific request. She’s not saying, “Quit being so

critical,” or “I need you to back off.” These requests would reflect how

she’s feeling, but they are unlikely to help, for two reasons. First, they set

up the terms of a fight. She’s giving her mother feedback but tripping all her

truth, relationship, and identity triggers at the same time. Her mother will be

likely to argue about whether it’s “true” that she’s critical, or switchtrack

because she feels unappreciated. She’ll be distracted as she wrestles with

whether she’s a “good mother” and a “good person.”

And second, the request is too general. “Back off” and “Quit criticizing”

are too vague, especially since Hunyee’s mother may not be aware of her

behavior in the first place. Remember that some of this is habitual behavior

that’s probably in a blind spot, and as such needs more than just a label.

So when setting boundaries, be specific about three things:

The Request. What, exactly, are you asking of them? Are

you putting a particular topic off limits (my new spouse, my

new weight), or a behavior (my ADHD, my football

watching)? If they need examples of what you’re talking

about, describe them as you recall them, along with their

effect on you.

The Time Frame. How long is the boundary likely to be in

place? Do you need time to sort things out for yourself, to

adjust your self-image, to take care of other priorities first,

to find your feet as a new stepparent or new leader? Let

them know if the boundary is time limited, and if not, how

they might check in with you about it without violating the

boundary. (“Can I ask how things are going with that thing

I’m not supposed to mention?”)

Their Assent. Don’t assume that they understand you or

agree. Instead, ask. When they say, “Yes, I will honor your

request,” it’s not just about you anymore. They’re making a

commitment, and that enlists their identity and reputation in

living up to their promise.

These conversations are harder in hierarchy, but with some thought, you can

often find an acceptable way in. At the investment firm, Brodie probably

isn’t going to say to his boss Jake, “Now you listen here, pal. I’ll have no

more of your constant criticisms!” But he might feel comfortable saying

that he appreciates having a mentor who cares so passionately about his

progress, and at the same time, is feeling a bit banged up as a result of their

conversations. Or he could request that Jake focus on one or two skills

rather than on everything.

DESCRIBE CONSEQUENCES

Finally, it’s only fair to let them know what’s at stake. You are telling them

to keep their judgments to themselves, or else.

Or else what?

Earlier we talked about the difference between threats and warnings.

Your purpose here isn’t to make a threat, it’s to issue a clear warning. You

need to let them know what happens if they can’t or won’t observe the

boundaries. They are free to accept your request, or not—you can’t control

their choice and shouldn’t try. But you are free to make adjustments to the

relationship on your end, as needed. Here’s an example of how you might

describe consequences:

“You know I’ve struggled with smoking, and I’m all too aware of the

causes of Uncle Marv’s illness. Right now I’m overwhelmed with my new

job and I can’t also handle side comments and knowing looks and

disapproval when I step outside to have a cigarette. I know you mean it to

be caring, but that’s not how it’s feeling. If you can’t leave the issue behind

for now, I’ll make sure to visit Marv at times when I know you won’t be

here.”

With any boundaries you set, don’t be surprised if others stumble here

and there as they work to honor the boundary. Don’t lie in wait for a single

slipup. They’ve had lots of practice being critical of you—they should

receive a lifetime achievement award, in fact—and those habits are hard to

break. Expect to have to give a couple of firm reminders, try to keep a sense

of humor about lapses, and appreciate progress where they are making it.

Of course, if they can’t or won’t work at it with you, then it’s up to you to

protect yourself.2

YOU HAVE A DUTY TO MITIGATE THE COST TO OTHERS

You’ve decided not to change. You’ve listened carefully to your children,

but are not yet ready to move out of the home you’ve lived in for sixty

years. You’ve heard the concerns from your team and are still going

forward with your plan to reorganize the department. Your husband’s ex-

wife wants you to get rid of your “germy” cat out of concern for her visiting

children, but you’ve decided to keep both the cat and the germs.

End of story?

Not so fast. We don’t always get to go our merry way, and bollocks to

those who don’t like it. Being in a relationship—whether at work or at

home—means being cognizant of the cost of our behaviors and decisions to

those around us. If you’re not going to change, you still have a “duty to

mitigate.” That means you need to do what you can, within reason, to

reduce the impacts of your actions (or inaction) on others.

INQUIRE ABOUT, AND ACKNOWLEDGE, THE IMPACT ON THEM

Ask how your choice affects others you live and work with. After much

thought, and discussions with several doctors, Larry decided that, for now,

he is not going to take medication for his ADHD. This has consequences

for him, of course, as he struggles to organize his life and get things done. It

also has consequences for his family and for his coworkers at the

construction site. Talking with them about the implications will, in large

part, determine the success of his efforts and of these relationships. In what

ways will his decision frustrate his family as they need to prod, prompt, and

remediate? What concerns do his crew members have for efficiency or

safety, and what processes can they put in place together to ensure a secure

work environment? The decision to take or not take the medication is

Larry’s; the consequences of that decision are shared.

COACH THEM TO DEAL WITH THE UNCHANGED YOU

Jackie knows she can dominate any discussion, and that she should leave

more room for others. After working at it—fruitlessly—for the last year, she

decides to give up for now. “I know I can be overbearing,” she tells her

teammates. “I tried to change. It was a lot of effort for almost no benefit. So

I give you all permission to cut me off. Red-card me, or throw me in the

penalty box. I don’t mean to dominate discussions but I imagine I’ll

continue to do it without realizing it. I promise I won’t think you’re being

rude; I need the help, and I’ll appreciate it.”

PROBLEM SOLVE TOGETHER

The idea isn’t to shut down discussion, but to open it up and to problem

solve about how to minimize the cost of your decision not to change.

Your children don’t want to worry about you living alone. Making

modifications to the house, moving a bedroom downstairs, hiring some

help, or getting a life alert system may help reduce their anxiety and make

you safer. Your staff is concerned about the impact on customers while

you’re all in the middle of a reorganization, so sit down together to map out

how you’ll ensure continuity of service.

Consider the issues between Mark and his younger brother, Steve. For

three decades Mark has been on Steve about his flakiness. The latest clash

concerns Mark’s season tickets for the Steelers: “When I offer you one of

my tickets, you’re always like, ‘Yeah, man, I’ll be there!’ But half the time

you show up late, and sometimes you don’t show at all.”

Steve can’t argue with his show rate, but he knows himself well enough

to know that there’s little chance he’s really going to change. Mark could

keep knocking his head against the wall, or he could stop inviting his

brother to the games.

But there’s a third option: Mark and Steve decide to assume that Steve

isn’t going to change, and problem solve about how to minimize the

aggravation to Mark. These days when Mark extends an invitation, they

discuss specific details regarding Steve’s assurances that he’ll make it on

time (“Are you double-booking yourself? What else is going on that day?

Do you need a ride?”), and the cost to Mark if Steve bails. Sometimes Steve

thanks him for the invite and suggests Mark ask someone else. At other

times, recognizing that Mark is really only asking him so they can spend

some time together, Steve makes an alternate suggestion that they go

golfing or out for a beer instead.

So Steve has set his boundary—I really don’t think I can change—and

he’s worked with his brother to reduce the impact on Mark. This allows

them to move on from the fantasy future of a changed Steve and to enjoy

who each of them is now. Paradoxically, the clarity of Steve’s boundary has

made it easier for the brothers to spend time together.

Summary: SOME KEY IDEAS

Boundaries: The ability to turn down or turn away feedback is critical to healthy relationships

and lifelong learning.

Three kinds of boundaries:

Thanks and No — I’m happy to hear your coaching . . . and I may not

take it.

Not Now, Not About That — I need time or space, or this is too sensitive

a subject right now.

No Feedback — Our relationship rides on your ability to keep your

judgments to yourself.

When turning down feedback, use “and” to be appreciative, and firm.

Be specific about:

The request

The time frame

The consequences

Their assent

If you’re not changing, work to mitigate the impact on others.

Ask about the impact

Coach them to deal with the unchanged you

Problem solve together

NAVIGATE THE CONVERSATION

In 1995, Toy Story hit theaters and forever changed animated movies.

Although the technology had been in development since the mid-1970s,1

Toy Story was the first feature-length film to use computer animation to

bring the characters to life. Rather than drawing each frame anew, computer

animators create what are called “keyframes”—or key moments—in the

action. The computer then fills in the movement between the keyframes.

The animator’s assistant, called the inbetweener, then refines the ’tweening

to create smooth and natural action.

KEYFRAMES OF THE CONVERSATION

The concept of keyframes is useful for talking about feedback

conversations. Whether we are givers or receivers, we can’t “script” the

conversation, and when we try, our counterparts have an irritating tendency

not to follow the lines we’ve written for them. But we can recognize some

keyframes—stages and moments in the conversation that can serve as

landmarks. If you can identify the conversation keyframes, you can do your

own ‘tweening.

• • •

Much of this book focuses on our reactions to receiving feedback. We’ve

included communication advice along the way, but in this chapter we take a

closer look at how to handle the conversation itself. What should you say or

do to maximize the chances you will learn something valuable?

THE ARC OF THE CONVERSATION: OPEN-BODY-CLOSE

Broadly, feedback conversations are made up of three parts:

Open: A critical piece, oddly often skipped when we jump right in

without getting aligned: What is the purpose of the conversation?

What kind of feedback would I like, and what kind is my giver trying

to give? Is the feedback negotiable or final, a friendly suggestion or a

command?

Body: A two-way exchange of information, requiring you to master

four main skills: listening, asserting, managing the conversation

process, and problem solving.

Close: Here we clarify commitments, action steps, benchmarks,

procedural contracts, and follow-up.

Below we examine each part in more detail.

OPEN BY GETTING ALIGNED

Your performance review has been on the calendar for months, but that

dressing-down you got this morning was—as far as you know—not.

Whether the feedback is scheduled or spontaneous, clarifying a few things

up front in the conversation is crucial.

CLARIFY PURPOSE, CHECK STATUS

Below are three questions that will help you and your giver get aligned.

1. Is This Feedback? If So, What Kind?

That birthday sweater from your mother that is a size too small might be a

mistake—or a message. Not being put on the project team could be a

resource allocation decision—or it could be feedback.

Ideally you would have this thought: Oh, this isn’t just a regular

conversation. I might be receiving feedback. I’d better get into my

receiving-feedback mindset. As unnatural as this sounds, doing so will help

prevent the reflexive retorts or hasty retreats that can hurt your relationships

and diminish the opportunity for learning. If you’re aware, you can make

conscious choices about how to respond.

If it is feedback, is it evaluation, coaching, or appreciation? You won’t

always know, and your giver won’t either. So, ask yourself this: What kind

of feedback would be most useful to me right now? If at the age of eighty-

three you’re finally letting another human being read your first short story,

don’t just say “Give me some feedback” if what you actually need to stay

motivated is encouragement: “Can you just tell me your three favorite

things about it?”

Also ask yourself this: What is your giver’s purpose? What do they think

you need? Listen for the real underlying issue. Their feedback might sound

like forward-looking coaching for you (“You’d be better off if you didn’t

work so much. . . . ”) when what they really want you to hear is a deeper

concern about how they’re feeling (“Your relentless pace is having a

negative impact on the team”). Be alert for challenging mixes (coaching

with evaluation) and cross-transactions (I wanted coaching but you’re

giving me appreciation). You may have different purposes, and that’s okay

as long as you’re both aware of that and talk them through.

2. Who Decides?

You can have a good back-and-forth, you can disagree and problem solve—

even if one of you is the ultimate decision maker. But you both need to be

clear who that is. The graphic design you did for the Chicken Farmers’

Convention is the best thing you’ve ever done, but the organizers—your

customer—would like the chicken to be more realistic looking. You believe

this will distract from the iconic power of the chicken. You wrangle back

and forth and arrive at an impasse. Who decides? Were you getting the

customer’s input so that you could render the final design, or were they

getting your input so that they could make the final call?

It’s often unclear whether feedback is a suggestion or a command. When

your boss says that you should wear a tie to the event, is he giving you

some helpful career advice (“You can always take a tie off”), or is he

issuing an order (“Wear a tie or you’re fired”)? You may or may not choose

to comply, but you’ll certainly want to know which category the feedback

falls into.

There’s a related common mistake: Two people engage in a conversation

as if they need to reach an agreement, when in fact agreement isn’t

necessary. Ending a relationship, for example. If you break up with

someone and they give you feedback that you are a terrible person, the two

of you don’t need to reach consensus on this point. They think you acted

badly, and you believe you acted thoughtfully, and that’s where it can

remain. You are the decision maker about the relationship’s ending; you are

each your own storyteller about why it ended.

3. Is This Final or Negotiable?

If the feedback is an evaluation, determine its status: Is it final or

provisional? If your performance rating is final, it’s important to know that

up front. If it’s provisional, then you may be able to influence the final

outcome. Often, receivers waste time trying to influence a decision that has

already been made and cannot be reversed. If it’s a done deal, spend your

time understanding it and talking about effective ways to handle the

consequences going forward.

YOU CAN INFLUENCE THE FRAME AND AGENDA

We often assume that because we’re on the receiving end of feedback, our

role is simply to react to the feedback giver’s opening, like returning a serve

in tennis. But regardless of how the other person starts, you can use your

turn to frame the conversation constructively and to offer an agenda.

If the giver launches directly into the middle of a conversation, you can

say: “Can we take a minute to step back so that I’m clear on our purposes? I

want to be sure I’m on the same page as you.” If they level an accusation

that strikes you as off base and are in a stubborn “I’m right” frame, reframe

the issue as a difference between you: “I want to hear your perspective on

this, and then I’ll share my view, and we can figure out where and why our

views are different.”

The opening is important because it sets the conversation’s tone and

trajectory. MIT researchers have found a correlation between skilled

interaction during the first five minutes of a negotiation and good

outcomes.2 Research on married couples done by John Gottman shows that

if the first three minutes of a fifteen-minute conversation are harsh and

critical, and not corrected by the recipient, the outcome is negative 96

percent of the time. A key factor in happy marriages, Gottman says, is a

couple’s ability to change course, to make and respond to “repair attempts”

that break the cycle of escalation between them.3

Remember, correcting course up front is about process, not substance.

You’re not telling the feedback giver what they can or can’t say; you’re

working to clarify the mutual purpose of the conversation and suggesting a

two-way exploration. This helps you get aligned for the rest of the

conversation.

BODY: FOUR SKILLS FOR MANAGING THE CONVERSATION

There are four skills you need to navigate the body of the conversation:

listening, asserting, “process moves,” and problem solving.

Listening includes asking clarifying questions, paraphrasing the giver’s

view, and acknowledging their feelings. Asserting is a mix of sharing,

advocating, and expressing—in essence, talking. Don’t confuse asserting

with “asserting truth” or with being certain. You can be assertive about your

point of view even as you are aware that it’s your point of view and not

necessarily the entire story; you can be assertive about your ambivalence;

you can be assertive about feeling doubt. We’re using the term “asserting”

because it captures a sense of leaning in, of sticking up for yourself, though

without being combative.

The third skill involves process moves—hinges that turn the conversation

in a more productive direction. You are acting as your own referee, stepping

outside the conversation, noticing where you and the giver are stuck, and

suggesting a better direction, topic, or process. Getting good at the oft-

neglected art of process moves can have a huge impact on the success of

your interactions.

Finally, problem solving turns to the question: Now what? Why does this

feedback matter, and what should one or both of us do about it? You assert

that I am too risk averse. And maybe I am, but not to the degree you

suggest. It’s important that we discuss this, but merely talking it through

doesn’t end the matter. We need to make a decision together about whether

to invest in this new venture, and that will require problem-solving skills.

We present these four skills in a stepwise fashion, starting with listening

and arriving triumphantly at problem solving. But real conversations are

rarely so neatly ordered. They tend to jump around, and that’s okay. The

order in which you use the skills is less important than that you use them.

All the listening in the world can’t make up for failing to assert the one

issue that matters to you, and there’s nothing you can assert that will make

up for failing to listen to what really matters to them. And if there are

problems to be solved, but you put them off, the glow of understanding will

soon fade, and you’ll wonder what all that talking actually accomplished.

LISTEN FOR WHAT’S RIGHT (AND WHY THEY SEE IT DIFFERENTLY)

Advice about listening is white noise. It’s so common and so boring that we

no longer even hear it. But if you’re drifting off, this would be a good time

to wake up. Listening may be the most challenging skill involved in

receiving feedback, but it also has the biggest payoff.

Your Internal Voice Is Crucial

If you think you and your giver are having a one-on-one chat, think again.

You have each brought along your “internal voice,” the running stream of

thoughts and feelings you have during the conversation in reaction to what’s

going on. (Your internal voice is going even now. See if you can hear it. It

might be saying, “What? I don’t have an internal voice!”)

Our internal voice is often fairly quiet, especially when we’re absorbed

in what someone is saying. But when we disagree with what they’re saying,

or feel emotional, our internal voice gets louder and demands more of our

attention. And when we’re listening to ourselves, we can’t also listen to

others.

You might figure that this is not much of an obstacle for you—you

weren’t even particularly aware of your internal voice, so how in the way

could it be?

Very in the way. Your fellow board member is saying something about

how you’re out of touch with the younger generation of employees, and

you’re thinking that’s just not true! Now your colleague has moved on to

say something else, but your internal voice is still making arguments about

how wrong his first point was. You don’t know what his new topic is

exactly, but it’s probably wrong, too.

Triggered: From Assistant to Bodyguard

Your internal voice is like a personal assistant whose job it is to make sure

no one bothers you: “Sorry, Ms. Goldstein is busy right now. She’s

absorbed in her own thoughts about how unfair you always are to her. You

might try coming back later.”

When you’re triggered, your internal voice goes from mere assistant to

armed bodyguard. When your boss, the head chef, yells, “If you can’t keep

up, get out of my kitchen!” your internal voice leaps to your defense and

shouts back (in your head): “If you’d equip this #*@$! kitchen properly,

maybe I’d have a chance!” The chef might get past your usual assistant, but

no one is getting past your bodyguard.

When Empathy Shuts Down

Recent brain research on empathy suggests that this bodyguard dynamic

isn’t all in our heads. Or rather, it actually is in our heads.

Tania Singer of the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience in London uses

fMRI to examine the neural processes that seem to correlate with empathy.

Using couples, Singer and colleagues examined the brain activity of one

partner (the female) under two conditions. First, Singer administered an

electric shock to the woman, transmitted via an electrode taped to the back

of her hand, as she lay in the MRI machine, and mapped her brain activity

as she processed the experience of being shocked (we’re not sure Singer

gets a lot of repeat volunteers). Next, Singer administered the same kind of

hand-shock to the woman’s partner, who was seated nearby and in view.

Here’s what’s interesting: When watching her partner get shocked, the

woman demonstrated the same pattern of brain activity as when she herself

had been shocked.

The patterns weren’t entirely identical. When the woman was observing

her loved one being shocked, the parts of the brain that register physical

pain did not light up (she did not feel the physical pain itself). But the parts

of the brain that register the emotional experience of being shocked did

light up. This phenomenon is called a “mirror neuron response,” and it

suggests that human beings are wired for empathy.4

Extending her research, Singer wondered whether we always empathize

with others’ pain or perspective. The answer is no. Singer had people watch

a game in which some participants played fairly while others played

unfairly. Observers had a mirror neuron response when watching fair

players get shocked, but had no mirror neuron response when the unfair

players were shocked. In fact, in some subjects who watched unfair players

receive shocks, the part of the brain connected to pleasure and revenge lit

up instead.5 The bottom line? We are wired for empathy, but only toward

those who we believe are behaving well.

What does this have to do with feedback? When we are receiving

feedback that feels unfair or off base, when we feel underappreciated or

poorly treated, our empathy and curiosity may be neurologically turned off.

So listening during a tough feedback conversation won’t come naturally.

Even those of us who are generous listeners in other contexts may have

trouble finding curiosity when we’re feeling triggered.

What Helps? Listen with a Purpose

If we’re going to be able to listen more effectively, it’s going to have to be

both on purpose and with a purpose. We’ll have to find or create some

curiosity—some tiny nudge that says that maybe the feedback in question

isn’t entirely unfair, that maybe the giver sees something we don’t, or at the

very least, their view is their view, and it might be useful for us to know.

Put simply, instead of wrong spotting, we need to listen for what’s right,

and be curious about why we see things so differently.

Prepare to Listen

Trigger Internal Voice

Truth “That’s wrong!”

“That’s not helpful!”

“That’s not me!”

Relationship “After all I’ve done for you?!”

“Who are you to say?”

“You’re the problem, not me.”

Identity “I screw up everything.”

“I’m doomed.”

“I’m not a bad person— or am I?”

Before getting feedback (if you have time to prepare), have a

conversation with your internal voice. There are a few things the two of you

need to get straight. Your task is not to scold your internal voice (“Don’t get

defensive”) or tamp it down (“Think whatever you want, but keep quiet”).

Just the opposite. Your internal voice gets loud because it wants your

attention. If you give it attention, it quiets down. So tune in to what it’s

saying, and work to understand it.

Find the Trigger Patterns

When you tune in to your internal voice, you’ll notice that there are

patterns; when we’re triggered, we don’t think just anything, we think

specific and predictable things. Knowing that gives us some traction on the

challenge of handling our triggers. There are endless variations, but each

kind of feedback trigger—truth, relationship, and identity—produces its

own characteristic internal voice patter.

And Then Negotiate

Once you identify your patterns, have a conversation with yourself. Your

goal is to hear your internal voice, learn to identify its triggered reactions,

and then engage it to help you feel curious. That conversation with yourself

might go like this:

You: During the feedback conversation, you’re going to be telling me

that what the giver is saying is wrong.

Internal Voice: Right. Because it will be wrong.

You: What will be wrong about it?

Internal Voice: All the usual things. They talked to the wrong people,

they’re interpreting it all the wrong way. They saw that one mistake

we made, but don’t appreciate all the other things we get right day

in and day out. I could go on.

You: Good to know you’re looking out for us. Let me ask you this:

What might be right about what they’re saying?

Internal Voice: Are you not listening to me? I just explained that

what they’ll be saying will be wrong.

You: I am listening. We’ll be mindful of those concerns. Even so, I’m

wondering what might be right about their feedback.

Internal Voice: Well, I suppose they could see things we don’t see.

That’s been known to happen. And their interpretation may be

different, but it could be valid. Also, they’ve been around the block

a few times. There’s that.

You: So there’s something to listen for.

Internal Voice: I suppose there’s a bit of mystery, yes. . . .

Not exactly Shakespeare, but you get the idea. Talk to your internal voice.

Acknowledge and appreciate it (they’re your own thoughts, after all).

Remind it that understanding doesn’t equal agreeing. Negotiate it toward

real curiosity. And finally, give it an assignment: I need you to be intensely

curious about what they’re saying. Help me dig in and understand. What’s

right about what they’re saying? Why is it that they see things differently?

Below is a chart that lists the common internal voice patterns and offers

ideas about what you’re listening for and what questions you might ask.

Listening’s Second Purpose: To Let Them Know You Hear Them

You aren’t listening to be polite. You aren’t listening because the giver is

right or because you’re necessarily going to accept or take the feedback.

And you aren’t listening because your own view doesn’t matter.

You are listening to understand. The first order of business is

archeological: You’re digging under labels, clarifying contours, and filling

in pieces you didn’t initially see. You’re assembling all the relevant

evidence and background to make sense of the size and shape of the

feedback from the giver’s perspective. After that you and your internal

voice can convene to decide what to do with what you’ve unearthed—how

it fits together with your own view, and whether or not you are going to

take their advice.

If understanding is purpose one, letting the giver know you understand

(or, just as important, that you want to understand) is purpose two.

Listening rewards the giver’s effort in taking the time to give you feedback,

and it leaves them feeling reassured that they have been clear. You may

need to have a later conversation about why you’ve decided not to take it,

and that might make them unhappy. But they can’t argue that you didn’t

take the advice seriously or that you didn’t understand it. And as a result,

they’re more likely to listen to you when you explain where you ultimately

landed and why.

Surprisingly, interrupting periodically (to ensure that you understand the

giver, rather than to assert your contrasting view) can be a sign that you are

listening well.6 So jump in: “Before you go further, can you just say more

about what you mean by ‘unprofessional’? I want to be sure I’m tracking

what you’re describing. . . .” Clarifying as you go can be helpful to both of

you.

Beware Hot Inquiry

Something to watch for: In an effort to keep listening even when we’re

upset, our questions may become “hot”—inquiry in punctuation only,

heated by the affront and frustration we’re struggling to contain. Our

feelings leak out into our “questions” and we end up saying things like

“Why are you so stupid?” and “Do you actually believe that?” Both of these

sentences have question marks at the end, but neither is a real question.

Inquiry is determined by the intention of the speaker, and the intention of

both these “questions” is to assert and persuade (or vent and attack), not to

understand.

Sarcasm is always inconsistent with true inquiry (“No, no, I love getting

eviscerating feedback from you. Do you have more?”), as are questions that

cross-examine (“But isn’t it true that . . . ?” “If so, how do you

explain . . . ?”). These are external signs of the wrestling match going on

between you and your internal voice. Your internal voice is saying, “Can

you believe this guy? Let me at ’em!” and you are replying, “Hold up!

We’re supposed to be asking questions!” The result is “inquiry” that’s

loaded with frustration and assertion.

What to do, then, when you are experiencing strong feelings? If you’re

overwhelmed, don’t try to fight through it and inquire. Instead, assert.

Replace hot inquiry like this: “Do you actually think that what you’re

saying is consistent or fair?” with a thoughtful assertion like this: “What

you’re suggesting seems inconsistent with the criteria you’ve used for

others in my position. That doesn’t seem fair to me.” You can then circle

back to listening: “Are there aspects of this that I’m missing?”

Assert what you have to assert. It makes listening easier and more

effective.

ASSERT WHAT’S LEFT OUT

It seems paradoxical to talk about assertiveness in the context of receiving

feedback. But feedback is not simply a thing the giver hands you and you

receive. The two of you are building a puzzle—together. They have some of

the pieces, and you have some of the pieces. When you don’t assert, you are

withholding your pieces. Without your point of view and feelings the giver

is unaware of whether what they’re saying is helpful, on target, or in line

with your experiences. There’s no problem solving, no adjusting, and no

indication of whether you understand the feedback, how you might use it,

or why trying it out is more challenging or risky than they assume.

Your assertions will often be in response to the giver’s feedback, but not

always. You might be asked to begin a performance review with a self-

assessment. But at some point, by definition, you will be getting feedback

and you will have things to say in response.

Shift from “I’m Right” to “Here’s What’s Left Out”

Effective assertion hinges on a key mindset shift: You aren’t seeking to

persuade the giver that you are right. You’re not trying to replace their truth

with your truth. Instead, you’re adding what’s “left out.” And what’s most

often left out is your data, your interpretations, and your feelings. As long

as you’ve made that shift, you can assert anything that’s important to you.

With both sets of puzzle pieces on the table, you can begin to see where the

two of you see things the same and differently, and why.

Common Assertion Mistakes

Below, we look at common assertion mistakes produced by the three

triggers—truth, relationship, and identity.

Truth Mistakes

The most common pitfall is slipping back into a “truth” mindset.

Pitfall: “That advice is wrong.”

Better: “I disagree with that advice.”

Why does this seemingly small distinction matter? Because it keeps the

topic of the conversation where it belongs. If you say, “That advice is

wrong,” the giver will simply respond by explaining again why it’s right. If

you say, “I disagree with that advice,” the giver can’t argue with the fact

that you happen to have an opinion on the matter. You do. All that is left is

to figure out why you see it differently. You might say this: “We had a

different approach in the last place I worked, and we had fewer problems

than we do here.” The giver doesn’t know what succeeded at your last job;

you don’t know what they have tried in the past here. That’s the

conversation to have.

Talking in terms of difference doesn’t mean that facts aren’t involved;

facts are often at the heart of the conversation. You need to know what the

sales numbers are before you can decide what they mean. But deciding

what they mean is probably the tougher, and more important, task.

Relationship Mistakes

The big relationship assertion pitfall is switchtracking. You can avoid that

by noticing that there are two topics, and giving each topic its own track.

Pitfall: “You’re a self-centered jerk.”

Better: “I’m feeling underappreciated, so it’s hard for me to focus on

your feedback. I think we need to discuss how I’m feeling, as well

as the feedback itself.”

If you say the first line, you’ll likely start a fight. If you say the second,

you’ll likely cause the giver to wonder what crazy books you’ve been

reading. But that’s preferable (usually) to the fight.

A second common pitfall is about systems, blame, and contribution:

Pitfall: “This is not my fault. I’m not the real problem here.”

Better: “I agree that there are things I’ve contributed to this. I’d also

like to step back to look at the bigger picture together, because I

think there are a number of other inputs that are important for us to

understand if we’re going to change things.”

Again, the first response is likely to start an argument about who the

problem is. The second signals willingness to take responsibility for your

contribution, while pointing out that you are not in this alone.

Identity Mistakes

When we’re off balance or overwhelmed, our assertions are more likely to

tip into exaggeration.

Pitfall: “It’s true. I’m hopeless.”

Better: “I’m surprised by all this and it’s a lot to take in. I want to take

some time to think about it and digest what you’ve said. Let’s come

back to it tomorrow.”

When you’re feeling overwhelmed, it’s unlikely that you will represent your

views in a clear or balanced way. In your effort to regain some balance, you

may take far more than your share of the responsibility for a problem, or

simply project amplified hopelessness and insecurity. Better to be open

about the fact that you’re surprised by the feedback and want time to figure

out what it means for you.

A second common pitfall occurs when your internal voice is hard at work

keeping the feedback out:

Pitfall: “That’s ridiculous. I’m not that kind of person.”

Better: “That’s upsetting to hear, because it’s not how I see myself or

who I want to be.”

You can signal that the information doesn’t fit with how you see yourself

without saying the information is wrong. And you can vow to figure it out

without saying the information is right.

BE YOUR OWN PROCESS REFEREE

For many years, when we taught communication workshops, we focused on

how to listen and assert. If that approach didn’t provide 100 percent of what

people needed to know, it seemed close enough.

But we started to notice something interesting. When we observed

people who were particularly skilled at communicating, they seemed to be

using a third skill that we couldn’t quite put our finger on.

Then it hit us. They were not only in the conversation, they were also

actively and explicitly managing the conversation. Supercommunicators

had an exceptional ability to observe the discussion, diagnose where it was

going wrong, and make explicit process interventions to correct it. It was as

though they were functioning in two roles at once: They weren’t just

players in the game, they were also referees.

Process Moves: Diagnose, Describe, Propose

These people sense precisely where they are in a conversation, including

the stage they are in and the common challenges in that stage. They have

the ability to diagnose on the fly where the conversation is getting stuck and

how to move it forward—not to manipulate things to their own advantage,

but for the sake of clear communication. They are willing to be

hyperexplicit, perhaps sometimes even awkwardly so, in their effort to get

things back on track.

Whatever your natural skill level, you can get better at these kinds of

process moves with awareness and practice. We ourselves have gotten

better by listening attentively to what process moves sound like, and so can

you:

“We’re both making arguments, trying to persuade the other, but I

don’t think either of us is listening to, or fully understanding, the other.

I know I’m not doing a good enough job of trying to understand what

your concerns are. So tell me more about why this is so important to

you and to the shop steward.”

“I see two issues here, and we’re jumping back and forth between

them. Let’s focus on one at a time. The first is that you’re upset

because you think I didn’t tell you about my upcoming trip to D.C. and

I’m upset because I think I did. The other is that you’re worried about

how you’re going to manage the kids’ schedules while I’m gone. Do

you agree, and if so, which do you want to talk about first?”

“You’re saying I’ve been treating Mom unfairly, and that any normal

person would know that. I disagree with both parts of that: I don’t

think I treat Mom unfairly, and I don’t think ‘any normal person’

would think I do. I’m not saying my view is right and yours is wrong.

I’m saying we see it differently. I wonder if there are aspects of how

you see this that I’m not fully understanding, as opposed to simply

disagreeing with? What would you add?”

“I’m shocked by this. My internal voice is saying, ‘My God, this is not

a question of interpretation. That simply did not happen that way!’

You seem upset as well and might be thinking the same. I’d like to take

a break and come back to this in a couple of hours after we’ve both

had time to calm down.”

“Okay, we’re deadlocked. We both need to agree on this, and we don’t.

Your solution is that I should give in. As a process, that doesn’t feel

fair to me. On the other hand, I don’t know how to break this

deadlock, so we’ve got to figure it out. What’s a fair and efficient way

to decide when we don’t agree?”

All of these examples have two things in common. The first is that none of

the comments are about the substance of the discussion per se. Each

contains an observation about some aspect of the process that is stuck or off

track. And each contains a suggestion for how to move forward or an

invitation to problem solving.

The second is that they all sound slightly awkward—not how regular

people talk. And paradoxically, that’s one of the reasons these kinds of

interventions can be so powerful. A referee stops the flow of the game to

make adjustments, and that’s precisely the goal of a process move. You are

pausing the action of the conversation to step back and consider how it’s

going and how you might correct course. These moves can short-circuit an

escalating cycle of frustration or disagreement, and they give both people a

chance to make a purposive choice about how to go forward together.

PROBLEM SOLVE TO CREATE POSSIBILITIES

We’ve been talking about how to understand feedback and how to

metabolize it in a way that is useful rather than destructive or dismissive.

But there’s often a next question at the heart of receiving feedback well:

Now what? What’s the point of all this hard work to understand feedback

anyway? What are you going to do with it?

This can be a challenging question, especially if you and the giver

disagree on what the feedback means or what should happen as a result.

When there’s conflict over this, you need strong problem-solving skills. To

most people’s surprise, being good at problem solving is not just a matter of

being “clever” or even “creative.” There are specific skills—questions to

ask, ways to approach things—that make a difference.

Create Possibilities

Sometimes, even when we believe the feedback is right, we feel that there’s

not much we can do about it. It’s dispiriting. It might be feedback about

deep-seated personality traits or physical appearance (if you are told you are

too tall for the leading man role, your efforts to adjust your height will

inevitably come up, well, short). Or taking the feedback would require such

major upheavals in lifestyle or habits or workload that you aren’t sure

they’d be worth the effort, or doubt that you would succeed even if you

tried.

But we can often create new possibilities even where there don’t seem to

be any. We saw an example of this in Alita’s obstetrics office in chapter 7.

Alita’s patients complained that she often ran late. Alita felt not only

discouraged, but stuck. Without some major structural overhaul to her

practice, running late was going to be a periodic feature of the patient

experience.

The patients have a preferred solution for the problem: Run on time. But

they have another interest as well. They want to understand why

appointments get backed up, and each still wants attentiveness when her

own time comes. This is why a sign in the waiting room explaining why

appointments run late actually meets some of the patients’ real concerns.

They understand the process. They feel acknowledged. They see that the

issue is not that the doctor doesn’t care, but that she cares a lot.

Finding possibilities requires two things: attentive listening for the

interests behind the feedback, and the ability to generate options that

address those interests. This can transform your feedback conversations

from arguments about whether the giver’s ideas are “the right way to go” to

explorations of what they’re trying to accomplish and how to get there.

Dig for Underlying Interests

In Getting to Yes, Roger Fisher, William Ury, and Bruce Patton make a

distinction that is crucial to problem solving: the difference between

interests and positions. Positions are what people say they want or demand.

Interests are the underlying “needs, desires, fears, and concerns” that the

stated position intends to satisfy.7 Often interests can be met by a variety of

options, some different from what anyone sees at the outset.

Advice often shows up as a position: It’s the giver’s best idea for what to

do differently. You often run late? Be on time. You micromanage? Cut it

out.

Listening for the underlying interests gives you more room to maneuver.

Consider the story of Earl, a social worker who helps disabled children and

their families. Earl wears his hair in a ponytail, has a long, scruffy beard,

and is missing his two front teeth. Although he is extremely good at his job,

his unorthodox appearance caused some families to take some time to feel

comfortable with him.

Earl’s supervisor suggested that he cut his hair and trim his beard. Earl

refused, and countered that people who would prejudge him for his

unconventional appearance were no different from people who prejudge a

child because of their disability. It was a fair enough point, but it didn’t

change the fact that Earl’s appearance injected tension into an already

challenging situation.

Earl’s supervisor took this position: “Clean up your appearance.” But

Earl heard through that for the underlying concern: “We want families to

feel comfortable with you more quickly.” Earl shared this interest and

suggested another way to address it. He asked his supervisor to describe

him a bit differently to new families before he met them. In addition to

presenting his professional credentials, he suggested that she add a few

words about his being a semiprofessional bluegrass banjo player.

This one additional fact about Earl put his appearance into a context that

the families understood. Instead of being surprised or put off by his

appearance, they were intrigued. Many connected with him on the subject

of music and came quickly to appreciate that his appearance attested to his

courage to be himself in the world—a lesson he was effectively teaching

both them and their children.

When you’re at an impasse—when what a giver suggests is difficult for

you or even unacceptable—ask about the underlying interests behind the

suggestion.

Three Sources of Interests Behind Feedback

The interests behind coaching or evaluation typically fall into one of three

buckets, and each suggests a different direction to go in creating options:

Helping you. The giver sees ways you could improve and

opportunities to accelerate your growth or learning curve. Or perhaps

they want to protect you from potential problems or dangers that they

see, but you don’t. Their goal is to help you.

Helping themselves and the relationship. The giver may be

giving you feedback because they feel upset, lonely, angry,

disappointed, or hurt by you. Instead of saying, “I feel neglected,”

they say, “You travel too much.” The feedback is about you and your

behavior, certainly. But the interests involved are not necessarily

obvious: You could make a concerted effort to travel less and then go

hunting more. You believe you “took” their coaching; they know you

missed the point.

Helping the organization/team/family/someone else. Sometimes

feedback is motivated by helping or protecting someone, or

something, beyond the two of you. Your boss can’t give you a higher

rating because it wouldn’t be fair to others. Your best friend doesn’t

really care that you often forget to pay her back, but knows that a

mutual friend is really upset when you forget to repay him. So she

steps in to raise the issue with you.

To solve the real problem, you have to understand the real interests. And to

understand the real interests, you have to dig behind the stated positions and

identify which bucket the interests fall into.

Generate Options

Once you’ve got a handle on the underlying interests (and whose interests

are actually involved), you can turn to the next step, which is creating

options. Life is easier when you find options that meet your interests as well

as those of the feedback giver.

It’s useful to be explicit about what you’re trying to accomplish. You can

name the different interests and invite the other person to think with you

about ways of meeting them. The number one reason we don’t come up

with good options is that we simply don’t think to try. So, try.

As in Earl’s case, some options solve the whole problem and fully meet

whatever the feedback giver’s interests are. Other options are “process”

options. We’ll try it your way and then take stock; we’ll trade off; I’ll draw

the chicken more realistically, and then we can show both to the organizing

committee and see what they think. You don’t need to have a final

determination about the feedback. Whether or not the feedback is fair is as

yet undetermined; what you agree on now is a process for moving forward

that feels fair to both of you.

CLOSE WITH COMMITMENT

How do we know a feedback conversation is over? Often it’s when

someone gives up, walks out, shuts down, or when time runs out. Even

when the conversation goes well, we often skip a crucial last step: figuring

out what we’ve agreed to and what to do next. If we’re not explicit, we

often end up disappointed by the lack of progress, or confused about the

other person’s lofty expectations. Both giver and receiver wonder why they

spent so much time on the matter to begin with, when nothing ever changes.

Closing with commitment can be as short as a sentence: “I want to think

about what you’ve said, and let’s talk tomorrow.” It doesn’t mean you have

to agree with the feedback or make promises to change. You can, of course,

but you can also commit to gathering more information or bringing others

into the conversation or seeing how things go in the next two weeks or

describing exactly which parts of the feedback you have decided not to

take. The goal is clarity. You should both know where things stand.

Depending on the formality of the context, here are a few different kinds

of things you can firm up as you wrap up:

Action Plans: Who does what tomorrow? What, if anything, is

each party going to change or work on, and what do you each agree to

do to make that happen?

Benchmarks and Consequences: How will progress be measured,

and when? Consider discussing what impact, positive and negative,

measuring will have. Also, discuss the consequences, if any, if

benchmarks are not met.

Procedural Contracts: In addition to promises about the substance

of what will change, you might make agreements on the process for

working on them. When do we talk again, and about what? You may

agree to gather more input from the client, the board, the neighbors,

the market. We may both vow not to discuss the matter in front of the

kids or the customer, or agree to give each other the benefit of the

doubt.

New Strategies: Whether at work or at home, the friction that

produces feedback often reflects differences between us that aren’t

going to go away. Rather than finding solutions in these cases we

should often be looking for strategies—new ways of working around

each other’s foibles and failures, forgetfulness, or fiery tempers. At the

end of the conversation, articulate the ideas you’ve generated for how

to accommodate each other more successfully, and again, make sure

you each know exactly what you’re agreeing to.

Remember: Feedback conversations are rarely one-shot deals. They are

usually a series of conversations over time, and as such, signposting where

you stand, what you’ve accomplished, and what you’ll try next helps you

travel the road together.

PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER: A CONVERSATION IN MOTION

As we’ve said, feedback conversations are unpredictable, and you’ll need to

deftly move among the skills we’ve described. Let’s take a look at an

evaluation conversation to get a sense of how you might use these skills in

motion.

AN EVALUATION CONVERSATION ABOUT RATINGS AND BONUSES

You’re in a year-end conversation with your head of function. The more

formal part of the meeting concerns bonuses, raises, and promotions. The

meeting also serves as a catchall opportunity to talk about anything

important: your thoughts on the previous year, your concerns for next year.

You were given a 4 out of 5 rating for the third year in a row. The bonus

awarded for a 5 is approximately double the bonus for a 4. You’re not

outraged, but you are frustrated. You were told last year that the big

differentiator between a 4 and a 5 is whether you’re bringing in customers

of your own rather than just running the division and serving the customers

of others. This year you made that a priority, and brought in twenty-three

new customer accounts, with contracts that raised your team’s revenue by

almost 20 percent.

Let’s look at four different ways you might handle the conversation. The

first three are variations on doing things less well; the fourth is more

effective. We’ll imagine in each case that the preliminaries are out of the

way and pick up the discussion at the point where you react to your rating

and bonus.

Version One

You Say: “This is just unfair. Last year I was told that I’d be rated a 5

if I brought in customers. I did that and now I’m still getting a 4.

Does anyone around here care about fairness?”

Analysis: We see four problems: (1) You are asserting that the

outcome is unfair, but you won’t actually know if it’s unfair until

you’ve discussed it further. It could be that you didn’t bring in

enough accounts, or that they were too small, or that the criteria

changed, or that you didn’t make it clear to anyone that you’d

originated these accounts, or that you misunderstood what was said

last year, or that other factors militated against a 5 even though your

customer work was good. After further conversation, you might

still conclude that the assessment is not fair, but you might not. (2)

“Unfair” is stated as a truth rather than as your perception. (3) The

comment about anyone’s caring is a personal attack based on an

attribution that you know little about. It could be that many people

do care about fairness, or that several advocated strongly on your

behalf. (4) Your comment is inexact. You were not told that if you

brought in customers you’d definitely get a 5; you were told that a

big differentiator between a 4 and a 5 is bringing in customers.

Result: Your boss might get hooked by any number of these

problems. Before you know it, she’ll be defending her identity as a

fair person, and an argument about “how your boss is” won’t help

resolve the issue you care about.

Version Two

You Say: “Well, okay. I think 4 is a little low, but I suppose it’s fine.”

Analysis: This comment is both unclear and passive-aggressive.

You’re effectively saying, “I’ll raise my concern just enough to

make you wonder what I think, but not so much that I take

responsibility for having raised it or that I’m clear about my actual

view.” Talk about it or don’t—but don’t “sort of” talk about it.

Result: Your boss will either not notice that you’re raising a

legitimate concern or be annoyed by the passive-aggressive tenor of

it. Either way, you don’t learn why you got a 4 or what you should

change, and it may negatively affect what your boss thinks of you.

Version Three

You Say: “Wow, I was thinking I’d get a 5. Is there any way it can be

changed?”

Analysis: There’s nothing wrong with saying you thought you’d get a

5, because you did think that. But, again, you don’t yet understand

why you got a 4, so a request to change it is premature. After the

discussion you may agree that a 4 is the appropriate rating, or you

may think you deserve a 5. If so, with what you’ve learned, you’ll

be able to articulate your reasoning.

Result: Your boss says “no.” End of story. End of learning. End of

chance to influence. Or, your boss says she’ll consider it, but has no

new information or way of thinking about the matter that would

make any difference.

Version Four: A More Skillful Conversation

Your goal is to assert that you are surprised and disappointed and to explain

why. At this point in the conversation you are not asserting that the rating is

unfair or requesting that it be changed, nor are you judging the overall

system or the people making the decisions.

You want to inquire into several things: You want to learn more about the

criteria and how they were applied in your case. You want to understand the

relationship between what you were told last year about customers and the

current criteria. You want to know if anything has changed, and what other

data—about peers, the market, pressures from above—might be relevant.

Once you’ve gotten a better sense of that information, you may or may

not feel the rating and bonus were fair, and you may or may not want to

raise that issue. If you do conclude that the rating is unfair, you would

express that as your own view, not as an objective fact. You should also be

explicit about whether you would like to revisit the actual rating or you are

having the discussion simply to help you understand the system, perhaps

with an eye toward next year.

We’ll assume your boss hasn’t read this book and is a little slow to

understand what you’re trying to do. So you’ll have to be persistent.

You: I’m surprised that I got a 4 instead of a 5. But I don’t actually

know much about the decision-making process or the criteria that

are used.

Boss: You think you deserve a 5?

You: Yes, I was thinking that, but as I reflect on it, I realize that that

wasn’t based on very much information. I was told at last year’s

review that one of the differentiators was bringing in new accounts,

so I worked hard to land twenty-three new customers and that

increased our revenue by almost 20 percent. I was assuming that

was enough for a 5, but I don’t have a clear sense of the criteria.

Also, there could be other factors involved that I’m not aware of.

Boss: I think a 4 is very good.

You: Well, I appreciate that. It’s still important to me to understand

better how the decisions are made.

Boss: You think it’s unfair?

You: I don’t have enough information to judge. Can you tell me what

factors are weighed in determining the rating? And can you say

what role new accounts and revenue play in the rating?

[The boss explains the rating system at some length, with you

interrupting periodically to clarify the process, terms, etc., until it’s

clear to you.]

You: Based on what you’ve just explained about the criteria, and

assuming there were no other factors, I do think I should have

received a 5. Do you see it differently?

Boss: In terms of revenue and customers, I would agree. But it’s not

an exact science. Different people on the compensation committee

may take slightly different factors into account.

You: I can only imagine how much work it is to sort this all out. Were

there additional factors that are relevant for me?

Boss: A few members of the committee raised questions about your

overall commitment. They have no problem with me sharing that,

but I didn’t mention it to you because I disagree with them. I think

it’s a nonissue and it would do you a disservice to emphasize that

or, really, even to mention it.

You: Of course it’s upsetting to hear, but it’s helpful to know. It tells

me that whether or not you or I think I’m dedicated, I’m coming

across at least to some people in a way that is raising some

questions.

Boss: Well, I suppose I could go back to the committee and see

whether there’s any wiggle room on your rating. I suspect there

isn’t, but I can check.

You: Well, how would that be perceived by the committee?

Boss: As you’d guess, there are a number of people who are going to

whine about their compensation no matter what it is. But

occasionally we really do need to reconsider.

You: Well, for the moment, I’d like to leave the rating alone. Would it

be okay if I talked to someone from the committee who has

concerns about my commitment? I’d like to learn more about that

perception before I decide whether to pursue changing the rating.

The conversation continues as you both explore options and nail down

commitments on how to go forward. But you’ve done a good job of

working to understand the feedback and demonstrating a willingness to

learn from it.

And the ability to learn from feedback is what will shape your future

most.

GET GOING

Five Ways to Take Action

Here we include a handful of ideas for getting moving—quick ways to

solicit feedback, to test out the advice you’re getting, to accelerate your

learning, and to gauge your progress.

NAME ONE THING

It’s his first performance review under the new system, and Rodrigo’s head

is spinning with charts, graphs, competencies, and comments. Rodrigo is

overwhelmed, and confused about what he’s actually supposed to do

differently.

At least he doesn’t have to contend with chocolate chip cookies.

Subjects in a recent experiment were not so lucky. Participants were

asked to skip a meal before arriving at the laboratory. They entered the lab

one by one, where chocolate chip cookies had been baking in a small oven,

saturating the room with the rich aroma. Half of the subjects were asked to

eat two or three cookies, while the other half were asked to refrain from the

cookies and instead eat two or three radishes.

Later, all were asked to solve a series of geometry problems, requiring

them to trace figures without lifting the pencil; they were given infinite

attempts and plenty of paper. Those asked to resist the cookies (and eat the

radishes) gave up twice as quickly, after about half the number of attempts

as their counterparts. Researcher Roy Baumeister and colleagues say that

the attention and effort that goes into resisting temptation (or forcing new,

less-appealing behavior) leaves less energy, attention, and persistence

available to complete other tasks.1

This has important implications for our efforts to act upon the feedback

we get to change behavior and habits. Feedback can be accurate, timely,

perceptive, and beautifully conveyed, but if it involves too many ideas to

keep track of, too many decisions to sort through, too many changes to

make, it’s simply too much. Our capacity to attend to change is a limited

resource. Hence, less is more (more or less).

So keep it simple, and here’s how: Name one thing. At the end of the day,

is there one thing you and the giver (or givers) see as most important for

you to work on? It should be something meaningful and useful, but don’t

get paralyzed by that. It doesn’t have to be the one perfect thing. That sends

you right back to no things. Just a useful thing. A place to start.

ASK: “WHAT’S ONE THING YOU SEE ME DOING THAT GETS IN MY OWN WAY?”

How to elicit just one thing? Don’t say, “I’d like some feedback.” That’s too

vague. Instead say: “What’s one thing I could work on?” Or, as we discuss

in chapter 4, you can sharpen it by asking: “What’s one thing you see me

doing, or failing to do, that’s getting in my own way?” This gives your

giver permission to go a little further than usual (hey, you did ask), and it

helps them prioritize and cut to the chase.

Of course, emergencies are emergencies; if your hair and pants are on

fire, the one-thing formula doesn’t quite fit. And don’t use “name one

thing” as a way to simply dismiss someone’s concerns. You may not be able

to work on ten concerns, but if your giver has ten concerns, they have them.

Work to understand and validate them, and then swing back around and set

priorities: “You’ve raised a number of different issues, and we’ve discussed

why each is important. I’m serious about improving, and it’s been my

experience that the best way for me to do that is to focus on one thing at a

time. Let’s figure out a good place for me to start.”

It’s not always easy. When your youngest daughter offers you feedback,

she’s not going to react well when you tell her you’ve already received your

“one thing” for the month from her older sister. So, depending on how big

or challenging the changes, you can work on a few at a time, especially if

they are on different fronts. You can be working on being more patient with

your oldest and more consistent with your youngest. In aiming for one,

you’re setting expectations: Let’s focus.

LISTEN FOR THEMES

Rodrigo’s feedback report contained dozens of comments and suggestions,

and three highlighted “areas of improvement.” Most of the feedback was

vague and label-y (for example, at the mean on “empathy,” below the mean

on “engagement”). In the end, it was the sheer volume of the feedback that

left him at a loss for where to begin.

So Rodrigo put aside the report and set off on his own mission. He chose

three people he worked closely with in different roles, and threw in his boss

and a coworker he found particularly irritating. He went to each and asked

this question: “What’s one thing I’m doing that you think gets in the way of

my own effectiveness?” He asked follow-up questions to clarify. The

longest conversation took ten minutes.

Rodrigo knew that he’d end up with more than “one thing” to consider,

but he looked for themes. Here are the headlines based on his

conversations:

Let us know where you stand sooner.

You hang back and let others dominate the conversation. Given your

unique background, we need you to weigh in earlier.

Be more visible at HQ.

I can’t tell when you’ve made a decision. If you have, tell us so we can

move on.

The way I think you shoot yourself in the foot is by being disorganized.

Of the five people he talked to, three went straight to his tendency as a team

leader to hang back and let conversation run. Until he received this

feedback, that shortcoming wasn’t even on his radar. (In retrospect he

realized that it had been mentioned in his feedback report, but if you hadn’t

already been looking for it, you’d never have seen it buried in the data.) In

fact, until now, he thought he had the opposite challenge: He worried that

he was not giving the team enough input into decisions and was working

hard at inclusiveness. After talking to colleagues, he discovered that there

were times when he needed to give more direction and be clear about when

he had made up his mind, so that they could move on to discussing

implementation.

So Rodrigo has decided his one thing for the next month is to work on

speaking up and providing more direction. One colleague offered a

particularly helpful bit of coaching: “She suggested that I be willing to go a

little overboard. If I do, she promised to tell me. If I’m less worried about

going too far, I’ll improve quicker.”

ASK WHAT MATTERS TO THEM

One last way to seek out one change that could have a big impact is to ask:

“What’s one thing I could change that would make a difference to you?”

Sharon posed this question to her three young boys over dinner: “I’ve been

under a lot of pressure at work, and I keep asking you for more help and

understanding. But let’s turn the tables. What’s one thing I could do

differently that would help you guys?”

Sharon couldn’t imagine any useful answer to this question. She figured

that if there were an easy fix, she’d already be doing it. Eight-year-old

Aidan yelled out, “more Skittles,” which sparked a fight between Aidan and

twelve-year-old Owen, who not unreasonably thought “more Skittles” was a

stupid answer. Not a strong start to the conversation.

Then ten-year-old Colin spoke up: “We never go bowling anymore.”

This struck Sharon as only marginally better than “more Skittles,” but

she could see that Colin was serious. “So you miss bowling?” she asked.

“Not that much,” said Colin.

Baffled, Sharon said, “So tell us why you mention bowling.”

Colin had an answer: “It’s the only time the four of us ever do anything

together, with just us, and we haven’t done it for a year.” He was right.

Foursome time mattered less to his more social brothers, but it mattered a

lot to Colin, and Sharon hadn’t noticed. Sharon called the alley and reserved

a lane.

One question, one thing.

TRY SMALL EXPERIMENTS

Sometimes you are clear about whether you want to take the feedback: Now

that I understand what you’re suggesting, I think it’s a fantastic idea and I

can’t wait to dive in. Or: Now that I understand what you’re suggesting, I’m

going to go ahead and say no (painting my living room black—it’s not the

right look for me). And sometimes we fall somewhere in the middle, unsure

if it’s a good idea or not. I’ll table it for now and I’ll come back to it,

perhaps if I get reincarnated as someone with free time.

In any event, we try to be analytical about the feedback we get,

considering pros and cons, weighing different options, and finally doing

what makes sense. But here’s the challenge: In any contest between change

and the status quo, the status quo has home field advantage. All things

being equal, we won’t change.

Emily is a good example. Her nonprofit, which supports young parents

and teaches parenting skills, was built from the ground up, with hard work

and a vision as big as the world. Her message is inspirational and her ideas

important.

Reaction to her two-hour public sessions has been overwhelmingly

positive. But time and again she gets feedback from coworkers, guest

speakers, and parents that her twenty-minute introduction to the

organization and its work at the beginning of her talk is too long. She

should jump right into the evening’s activities.

For five years Emily resisted these suggestions. After all, she was a great

speaker, she knew how to motivate people, the workshops got strong

reviews, and she’d been successful doing it her way. There was just no

reason to change things up until now.

When things are going well, feedback can feel threatening, and not just

because it suggests we have something to learn or aren’t yet perfect. It’s

threatening because it is asking us to let go of something that’s comfortable

and predictable. We’re already doing just fine, and even if we’re not, at

least we’re aware of the consequences. I know I’m late for everything, but

so far it hasn’t had a disastrous impact on my life. The guests didn’t have to

wait that long, and in the end, we got married, didn’t we?

DON’T DECIDE, EXPERIMENT

Here’s our pitch: Experiment. Try the feedback out, especially when the

stakes are low and the potential upside is great. Not because you know that

it’s right or you know it will help. But because it’s possible it will help. And

because actions so often have unforeseen consequences, and trying new

things stirs the pot. And because you (we) don’t try new things often

enough.

Try It On

Sometimes you can do the experiment in your head.

Harpreet had been teaching for several years when he received a

shocking set of comments on a student evaluation: “The professor is

arrogant and condescending toward students. He is dismissive of their ideas

and concerns.”

Harpreet felt ill. This characterization could not be more out of step with

his values and self-image. Dedicated to fostering students’ growth in his

lab, he prided himself on his commitment to mentoring. He decided to

discuss the evaluation with his department head. “Look at these comments,”

he said to her. “I can’t understand how a student could say such a thing.”

She skimmed the comments and after a moment looked up and said,

“Well, try it on.” Harpreet was dumbfounded. He sputtered, “I’m not sure

what you mean.” “Try it on,” she repeated. “Assume the student is on to

something.”

“But the student is not on to something,” Harpreet protested, sort of

joking but mostly not.

“Sit with the possibility for a few days,” she suggested. “Not because

you already know it fits, but because it’s a good way of finding out. If it

doesn’t, no worries. Take it off. But if it does, even in some small way, then

it gives you something to work on.”

Trying on a piece of feedback in your mind’s dressing room can be

uncomfortable, but it’s a low-risk way of experimenting. Harpreet did try on

the feedback, and after considering it from different angles, he began to see

what the student might have meant. While he didn’t regard certain

comments that he had made as arrogant, he could see now how someone

might. This new perspective on himself—not “the truth,” but an alternate

way of seeing—proved enormously valuable for Harpreet and influenced

how he interacted with his students for the rest of his career. And he would

not have had access to it if he hadn’t taken a genuine run at trying it on as

true.

Try It Out

For years your spouse has been urging you to wake up earlier and do yoga

before going to work. There are two things you don’t like about this

suggestion: waking up early and yoga. You can’t see how trying it would

have any positive effect on your life. And you have a rule: “If you can’t see

how trying something would help, don’t try it.” Your spouse thinks you’re

being lazy, but you know you’re just being smart.

And then this thought pops into your head: I am fifty. If I live to be eighty

I will wake up roughly 11,000 more times. If I try yoga and don’t like it, I

will have 10,999 mornings remaining to wake up at my preferred time.

So one morning you wake up early and go to yoga. You are surprised to

learn that this yoga is different from the yoga of your youth. The instructor

said to you afterward, “I hope you didn’t injure yourself.” But despite this

“feedback,” you have to admit that you sort of liked it. And you certainly

liked the effect it seemed to have on the rest of your day. You decide to go a

few more times, just to test this out.

The one downside of this situation is that your spouse gets to be right,

and you have to admit you were wrong. But you protest: “I wasn’t wrong,

because it’s different yoga, and there’s no way I could have anticipated

that.” Exactly. That’s why such low-cost experiments are so great. You do

them even though you have misgivings, because you know that you are

occasionally wrong. Not as often as your spouse thinks, perhaps, but

occasionally.

You May Be Surprised

Dr. Atul Gawande is an accomplished surgeon, New Yorker writer, and

professor at Harvard Medical School. You’d figure if anyone was feeling at

the top of their game, it would be this guy.

But Gawande wondered if he could improve. So he hired a surgical

coach to observe him, looking for ways he might enhance both his surgical

technique and his already-commendable outcomes. He figured it was

possible the coach would see something he hadn’t.

The coach’s recommendations surprised Gawande. He had a number of

technical suggestions (“When you are tempted to raise your elbow, that

means you either need to move your feet or to choose a different

instrument.”).2 The coach was also able to point out some of Gawande’s

blind spots: The way he draped the patient for surgery gave Gawande a

perfect line of vision on the procedure but partially obstructed the view of

his assistant across the table. This was invisible to Gawande but instantly

obvious to the coach. And the coach “pointed out ways I had missed

opportunities to help the team perform better,” observes Gawande.3 The

impact of the advice was large. After following the coach’s ideas—a few at

a time over a number of months—Gawande has seen his complication rates

go down.

Gawande didn’t hire a coach because he knew he needed one, or foresaw

these particular improvements. He hired one because there didn’t seem to

be much downside in doing so, and the upside, though unclear, seemed

worth exploring. And it certainly proved worthwhile for his patients and for

his team, who saw him model an interest in and openness to continuous

learning and improvement.

IT’S NOT ALL-AND-ALWAYS

Lowering the stakes often means reframing the question you are asking

yourself when it comes to feedback. If the question is “Should I go to yoga

for the rest of my life?” the answer will always be no. If it’s “Should I try

yoga for one morning and see what I think?” the costs drop dramatically.

Emily heard the advice she was getting—cut out the twenty-minute

windup—as an all-and-always suggestion: Do your workshops entirely

differently for the rest of time. And by the way, it wouldn’t hurt if you

admitted you had been wrong all along.

Emily finally changed when she shifted away from the all-and-always

frame. While she wasn’t yet persuaded that scrapping the twenty minutes

spent on the big-picture vision was the right call, she decided to try it for

one night to see what happened. She welcomed the new parents and then

jumped right into the program.

The results of her experiment? There were a few awkward moments

when Emily lost her place without her regular script. And it turned out that

there were parts of her standard intro that she wanted to retain. But she did

find that the full twenty minutes weren’t really necessary: “Next time I’ll do

five minutes on what they really need to know and hand out something

written at the end for those who want more details.”

It’s not all-and-always. Just some-and-sometimes.

Some experiments will inevitably turn out to be a waste of time—that’s

why they’re called experiments. But in the aggregate, there are significant

life rewards for being willing to test out feedback even when you’re not

sure it’s right, or even pretty sure it’s wrong. At the very least, it shows the

giver you are open to trying their advice, and there are surely relationship

advantages to that.

RIDE OUT THE J CURVE

This is the story of Bernardus and the new customer tracking system. Stop

us if you’ve heard it before.

The head of sales has been after Bernardus for months to use the new

Web-based database that enables you to enter and retrieve data from

anywhere, and share information with everyone. If Bernardus goes on

vacation he won’t have to spend hours bringing someone up to speed on a

particular account; he’ll just give them the file name. And he will no longer

have to worry about finding those little scraps of paper with numbers and e-

mails and cryptic notations describing the customer’s priorities and

preferences.

It’s a wondrous system; Bernardus is convinced of its usefulness. But he

can’t get himself to actually make the switch. He starts using the system,

gets frustrated, and switches midway through a customer call. Or he uses

the system for a few days, and then forgets and realizes a week later that

he’s got hours of data to enter to catch up. His note-taking habits have been

years in the making and feel dependent on a pencil and trusty paper, no

matter how dog-eared. It’s not rational. It is resistant to change.

Sometimes we don’t do the right, smart, effective, healthy thing because

we don’t know what that is. But sometimes we know exactly what the right,

smart, effective, healthy thing is, and we still don’t do it.

TWO DECISION MAKERS

This isn’t a new problem. You remember the story of Odysseus? He’s

worried about being seduced by the sirens, whose songs have lured many a

sailor to shipwreck. Odysseus knows he won’t be able to make the right

choice once he’s in the midst of the straits and hears their alluring song. So

instead of relying on willpower exercised in that perilous moment, he has

his sailors tie him to the mast ahead of time. Odysseus “precommits” to

honoring his current desire, preventing his ability to waver when faced with

future temptation.

Homer was on to something about the challenges of making good

choices, potentially as useful to Bernardus as it was to Odysseus. Economist

Thomas Schelling says much of our puzzling behavior when it comes to

(failing to) keep our commitments to ourselves results from a kind of split

personality we all possess.4 We decide on Sunday night that come Monday

morning we will finally start that low-carb diet. So far so good. But when

Monday morning arrives, we are faced with choices: Should I enjoy my

usual breakfast muffin, or restrict myself to eggs and ham? Not green, but

without the carbs, almost as unappealing. Well, there’s really very little

difference between starting that diet today and starting tomorrow, or even

next week, for that matter.

So our Monday Morning self violates the agreement made by our Sunday

Night self. Mr. Sunday Night wants to stop procrastinating and start the

diet. He’s disgusted by Monday Morning guy’s refusal to change but what

can he do? Come Monday morning, Monday Morning guy is in charge.

So Mr. Sunday Night asks himself: Is there a way that I can not only

make the choice to change but also bind Monday Morning guy to abide by

my choice? There is. Mr. Sunday Night can change the terms of the choice

so that Monday Morning guy arrives at the “right” conclusion: We’re both

going to start that diet.

Mr. Sunday Night can do that in one of two ways: He can increase the

positive appeal of the desired change or increase the negative consequences

of not changing.

INCREASE THE POSITIVE APPEAL OF CHANGE

Let’s look first at how to make changing more appealing to Monday

Morning guy.

Make It Social

Unpleasant things are less unpleasant when you have company. Find a

friend, colleague, coach, or fellow aspiring dieter and suggest doing it

together. Agree on check-in times, e-mail reports of trials and triumphs,

have (low-carb) lunch to discuss progress. Commiserate. Coach, support,

honestly reflect.

An obvious reason that making it social helps is that it makes a task that

might not otherwise be fun, fun. Or a little bit fun, anyway. And combining

change with human connection recasts the emotional story of the effort. It’s

no longer “I’m suffering,” but “We are getting through it together.” Friends

have mutual closet-cleaning days; students study together; otherwise

solitary writers share office space.

A second reason is that it makes you accountable to someone else. You

might be okay letting yourself down, but now you have your friend to think

of, too. And finally, walking the journey alongside someone else can

provide appreciation. A dieting friend or newly hired personal trainer really

understands the sacrifices you are making. They witness your progress, see

you sweat, cheer your efforts. Their appreciation helps motivate you to stick

with it even when you are not particularly in the mood.

Extroverts are probably thinking this makes a lot of sense—they

typically get energy from being with other people. Introverts may be

hearing this suggestion as just one more burden—not only do I have to diet

or exercise, but now I have to meet people, too?

You can get the benefits without having to buddy up or join a rah-rah city

bicycling club. Online communities provide a place to check in, to get

empathy, gather useful tips, and be accountable, without having to get out

of your pajamas or endure awkward small talk. Communities have formed

on the Web for just about anything you might be dealing with—whether it’s

getting your spending under control, coping with the stress of caring for

your autistic child, or losing weight. Maybe Bernardus can find one—or

start one—for finally using that customer tracking software. After all, it is

wondrous.

Keep Score

Another way to increase the reward of keeping a commitment is to keep

score. Keeping score is a primary reason that video games are so addictive

—they offer an instant measure of your progress and an invitation to reset

and try again.

Shigeru Miyamoto is the creative force behind Nintendo’s best-selling

video games—the Mario Bros. franchise and The Legend of Zelda. When

Miyamoto turned forty, he decided to get in shape. He took up jogging and

swimming, and kept elaborate charts of his activity and his weight taped to

the bathroom wall. By “keeping score” this way, he shifted his workout

regimen from a self-improvement kick to a game.5

He did so for himself, and then for the rest of us: Miyamoto’s Wii Fit is

the third highest-selling console game of all time. A balance board weighs

you in, and your workout time and accomplishments are tracked as you jog

through island wonderlands or hula hoop. Introducing an element of play

can “get people to do things they might not normally do,” Miyamoto

explains. It’s a way to engage your playful self in facing a challenge and

solving problems. And keeping score is a way to set up those positive

feedback dopamine hits that entice you to keep trying.

Gamification6 has such pull that it’s now being used (not without

controversy) for everything from customer engagement to education. Many

middle school science teachers in Massachusetts encourage their students to

play JogNog, an online game in which students accrue points for answering

“towers” of science questions, with their accomplishments ranked

nationwide on a real-time leaderboard. Eighth grader Antoine, who had

previously declared science class “boring” and “too easy,” found himself

using scarce weekend screen time not for video games, but to complete

thousands of science questions. As he scanned the leaderboard, noting the

point gap between himself and the student above him, he mumbled, “Now I

have to pass him—just to keep my honor.” It’s not just about science

anymore.

The best games strike a “magical balance between the excitement of

facing new problems and the swagger from facing down old ones,” writes

Nick Paumgarten about Miyamoto’s Nintendo games. You can’t stay

motivated if you have to try your hardest all the time. You need to

experience the satisfaction of exercising skills you have mastered,

interspersed with the new ones you’re working hard to improve. It can’t be

all learning curve. You need the downhills to coast and recharge.

How to capitalize on these insights when it comes to acting on your

feedback and working to change? Well, whatever the task you’re engaged

in, are there ways to keep score? Are there ways to make the process more

competitive, playful, or satisfying? If you’re working on procrastination,

can you create an incentive system for daily pieces of a project

accomplished? If you’re trying to act on your husband’s request that you

stop swearing, paying into a quarter jar not only raises your own awareness

but makes it fun for your kids to “help.” Download an app that will track

your food choices and calorie count. Put on a pedometer and see if you can

beat yesterday’s step total. This type of approach just might persuade

Monday Morning guy to leave the muffin behind.

INCREASE THE COST OF NOT CHANGING

So far we’ve been talking about ways to tip the calculus in favor of change

by increasing the appeal of trying to change. Now let’s turn to the other side

of the scale: how to increase the cost of choosing not to change.

Tie Yourself to the Mast

Here’s a thought: What if the choice was “go low carb, or choose the muffin

and donate $500 to the American Nazi party”? Well, that sure changes the

siren song of the muffin, right?

But why would one of your choices ever be “eat the muffin and donate to

the American Nazi party”?

It wouldn’t, unless you designed it that way on purpose, by tying

yourself to the mast. How would that work? You give a friend $500 to hold

for you. If you don’t start your diet when you say you will, he agrees, for

real, to donate the money to the American Nazi party. It has nothing to do

with your diet, but it certainly changes the terms of the choice.

Thomas Schelling finally stopped smoking by using the threat of

donating to the American Nazi party on himself. He has helped doctors

break their own drug addictions by having them write a letter to the medical

board confessing the problem, seal it, and entrust it to a friend who will

mail it if they relapse. One more hit of cocaine isn’t just one more hit; it’s

their license, their career, and their reputation.

Recognize the J Curve

As you work to change, there’s a pattern that’s worth getting to know,

because it’s so common and has such a profound effect on our behavior and

choices. This pattern is important precisely because its tricky shape can

otherwise fool you.

When we try to take feedback that requires change or start any new and

challenging activity, a common pattern that results is what’s called the J

Curve. Imagine a graph where the vertical axis gauges well-being

(happiness, contentment, etc.), and the horizontal axis represents time. High

is happy, low is unhappy. Left is now, right is later.

In terms of happiness we start somewhere in the middle. We’re going

about things the way we always have and so we’re perhaps medium happy.

Maybe our usual approach is working reasonably well though it generates

complaints (feedback) from others, or maybe we’re not happy with the

status quo ourselves, but so far we haven’t been able to change.

Now, however, we’re going to get serious. We’re going to finally learn to

swim, get out and meet people, cut back on gossiping, leave ourselves more

time to get to the airport, provide more mentoring for our team members.

As we begin to implement our change we may find that our level of

happiness immediately drops. It’s uncomfortable. It’s awkward. We get

worse at whatever we’re doing rather than better; we feel vaguely

depressed. We begin to slide downward, and we seem only to be heading

lower. We not unreasonably take stock: I may not have been thrilled before,

but now, as I’m changing, things are taking a turn for the worse. I feel

awful. I don’t like this change.

That’s how things feel now. And we begin to wonder about the future.

How is this going to turn out, this new thing we’re doing? We’ve done

nothing but head downhill, as if pulled by gravity. Do we keep sledding

downward until we crash?

Of course not. We should stop. This effort to change was a big mistake.

We cancel the change. Sorry, Mr. Sunday Night, we tried. It just didn’t work

out.

It’s a sad story, but it makes sense . . . if, that is, our projection that we

are going to continue to go down is correct. But what if we’re at the bottom

of the curve and are about to head up the happiness slope? What if we are

on our way to surpassing our previous level of contentment and skill?

In other words, what if the curve is in the unlikely shape of a J? The truth

is, at any time you are changing your habits or approach, or working on a

new skill, you are likely to get worse before you get better. And more

important, you are likely to feel worse before you feel better. In these

moments, it’s useful to know that a common trajectory isn’t further

downward, but—eventually—back up.

This suggests that committing in advance to working at something for a

specific amount of time—a time that reaches past that most challenging first

stage—can be useful. Give it two weeks, thirty days, a fiscal year—

whatever seems like a reasonable duration to test whether this new behavior

might actually help. Whether you’re learning to sleep with a breathing

machine to help your apnea, or learning to stop running the experiments

themselves and start running the lab, you need to resist letting the dip of the

curve erode your resolve.7

Understanding the typical trajectory of the J Curve is what ultimately

helped Bernardus. His first few weeks with the online database were a

minor disaster. He lost data, and it took him longer to input information into

the computer than to take handwritten notes. But he started keeping score of

the number of customers he successfully entered, and his miss percentage

slowly started to improve. Six months later he takes notes in the database

while directly on the customer call, and he’s starting to enjoy the benefits of

having all of his customer information accessible in one place, and on his

phone, freeing him from needing to carry his laptop 24/7. Bernardus is now

enjoying the upswing of that happiness curve.

All of these ideas can help you to make good on your commitment to

implement feedback and to change. By seeing the choice in a new light, or

by actually changing the choice, you can change your behavior, and that

very often sets in motion a virtuous cycle. And motion—getting going and

keeping going—is the goal.

COACH YOUR COACH

When one of the authors was in high school (we won’t say which author),

he played defensive back on the football team. He saw limited action his

junior year, so was excited one Saturday afternoon to be called into the

game. As the defense huddled, the defensive captain barked out the

formation: “In and Out Zone!” Everyone ran off to their respective

positions.

Just prior to the snap, Doug shouted in panic to the captain: “What’s an

‘In and Out Zone?’” Doug’s internal monologue was running like this: I’m

playing varsity football in front of all these people and I have no idea what

the defensive formation is. I don’t know where to go or what I’m supposed

to do. What’s wrong with me?

The captain yelled back: “We don’t know! Just guard someone!”

After the game Doug expected the captain—or someone—to ask the

coach exactly what an “In and Out” formation involved, but no one did.

Apparently, if you didn’t understand the formation, you were just supposed

to “guard someone.” And that’s what Doug did, for the rest of the season.

At season’s end the team had a perfect record: 0-8.

Doug could have said to the coach: “Can we go over the formations

again slowly until I really understand them?” But he feared admitting what

he didn’t know, and anyway, that’s not how things worked: The coaches

coached, and the players played. Players didn’t “coach the coach” to help

the coaching staff understand what the players actually needed to learn to

get better results.

Here we’ll use the term “coach” broadly to mean anyone who gives you

feedback. That includes formal mentors, of course, but more often our

“coaches” are peers, clients, coauthors, collaborators, bandmates,

roommates, friends, or family members. We collaborate to turn out the best

product, we ask colleagues to help us get up to speed, we get advice—

solicited and unsolicited—from a financial planner or our uncle Phil. Too

often, though, we respond the way the players on that football team did: If

we don’t understand the advice, or how it’s being offered to us isn’t helping,

we don’t step back and discuss it. Our colleagues and family aren’t even

aware that the advice isn’t getting through. Or perhaps they are very aware

it’s not getting through, but they’re not seeing that how they’re handling it

is part of the problem.

That’s unfortunate, because coaching your coach—discussing the process

of what helps you and why—is one of the most powerful ways to accelerate

your learning.

WHAT COACHING YOUR COACH DOESN’T MEAN

“Coaching your coach” does not mean laying down the law about how you

wish to be talked to: “When you point out that I come in late all the time, it

makes me feel bad, so from now on let’s stick with praise.” Or: “I’d do a lot

better on this eye exam if you tested me with bigger letters.”

The goal is not to erect barriers to the delivery of challenging or

inconvenient feedback; in fact, it’s just the opposite. Your aim is to find

ways that you and your coach can collaborate so that communication is

clear and efficient and you learn what’s most important to learn as quickly

as you can. The goal is to work together to minimize the interference.

And that’s a negotiation. You’ll have preferences, and your coach will

have preferences. You’ll make requests that won’t work from the coach’s

point of view. That’s the nature of these conversations. It’s not about

making demands; it’s about figuring out together what works best.

TALK ABOUT “FEEDBACK AND YOU”

There are plenty of things about how you receive feedback that aren’t in

your awareness. It’s not as if you spend twenty-four hours a day reflecting

on your feedback strengths and weaknesses, and in any event, we all have

blind spots. But you are probably aware of some of the ways that you react

to feedback—after all, you’re thinking about bringing it up because

something about the current process isn’t working for you (including,

sometimes, that you’re getting no coaching at all). Whatever that something

is, talk about it explicitly with the person giving you feedback. Here are

slices of what that might sound like:

Subtle doesn’t work with me. Be really explicit and don’t worry about

hurting my feelings. You won’t.

I tend to get defensive at first, and then I circle back later and figure

out why the feedback is helpful. So if I seem defensive, don’t be put off.

I’ll be thinking about what you’ve said, even if it doesn’t sound like it.

I react better when you present your advice as an idea that might help,

rather than as “the obviously right answer.” In that frame, I notice

that I get hooked into arguing about whether it’s “obvious” or

“right,” rather than just considering whether it’s worth trying out.

Here’s what I’ve been working on lately, in terms of self-improvement:

___. That’s the area I need the most help with right now, and I’ve been

putting other things on the back burner, even though I know I need to

work on them, too.

I’m really sensitive to negative feedback. So don’t give it in the middle

of a presentation unless it’s urgent and immediately actionable.

Put your ideas out there, explain your thinking behind them, and be open to

your coach’s thoughts about what you’ve told them.

It’s easy, by the way, for coaches to dismiss your requests and concerns

by thinking, Well, sure, there’s an ideal way we’d all like to hear feedback,

but what really matters is the feedback itself. And that’s partly true—the

conversation is not a set of obstacles around which your coach has to

maneuver. But often our own observations about how we learn best can

make a huge difference in our ability to take in the feedback. We’re

explaining our particular defensive formation not to block givers out, but to

help them get through.

DISCUSS PREFERENCES, ROLES, AND MUTUAL EXPECTATIONS

Sometimes the person giving you feedback actually is a mentor or executive

coach, or perhaps a peer or friend who is particularly inclined to give you

advice. In these cases, it can be useful to talk more broadly about feedback

styles and preferences and the challenges of learning.

Three topics should be kept front and center. The first two are about the

receiver:

(1) Your feedback temperament and tendencies;

(2) Growth areas you are currently working on.

The third is about the coach:

(3) Their philosophy, strengths and weaknesses, and requests.

On the following page is a set of questions that can move you into helpful

territory.

It’s also useful to clarify whether the coaching is confidential, how often

you will get together, how you will measure progress, and what your

priorities and goals might be. Get aligned on where you are going and how

you will get there.

The coaches in our lives also include “accidental coaches,” like your

neighbor who is being a pain. Discussing roles and mutual expectations can

be helpful here, too. Let’s imagine that your neighbor is upset that your dog

periodically finds her way into his garden. The neighbor is “coaching” you

to put up a taller fence, stake the dog on a chain, or, ideally, find her a new

home far, far away. Your neighbor is conveying his coaching via notes left

in your mailbox.

This is not working for you. First, you’re not convinced your dog is in

his yard as often as the neighbor claims, but it’s hard to tell since you often

don’t learn about it until the following day when you pick up your mail.

Plus, you are surprised and put off by the hostile tone of the notes.

Whether this situation deteriorates or begins to right itself has little to do

with the dog and everything to do with whether you take the initiative to

coach your coach. Pick up the phone, or better yet, walk next door with the

express purposes of (1) gathering more data on what’s actually going on—

how often your dog pays a visit, what your neighbor does when he sees her,

and whether there’s been any damage or particular behavior that prompts

the concern; (2) coaching your neighbor on how he can best work with you;

and (3) setting some mutual expectations about how you’ll work together.

Grab Bag of Questions for Coach and Coachee

Who has given you feedback well? What was helpful about how they did it?

Have you ever gotten good advice that you rejected? Why?

Have you ever received good advice that you took years later?

What motivates you?

What disheartens you?

What’s your learning style? Visual, auditory, big picture, detail oriented?

What helps you hear appreciation?

What’s something you wish you were better at?

Whose feedback-receiving skills do you admire?

What did your childhood and family teach you about feedback and learning?

What did your early job experiences teach you?

What’s the role of time/stages?

What’s the role of mood and outlook?

What’s the role of religion or spirituality?

What has been the impact of major life events? Getting married? Getting laid off or fired?

Having children? Death of a parent?

What do you dislike most about coaching? About evaluation?

What helps you change?

So you might say, “When you see her in the yard, please call me right

away. When you leave a note I don’t learn about it until the following day,

and that makes it hard to assess why she was out in the first place.” You

might add, “I was hopeful that our fence was effective, but something isn’t

working. Give me a little time to explore whether she needs to be retrained,

or whether we’re going to have to come up with a better solution. I’ll give

you an update by the weekend.” Letting the neighbor know that his

concerns have gotten through, and that it will take you some time to learn

more and sort out solutions, will help prevent escalation of the conflict.

HIERARCHY AND TRUST

Hierarchy can have an impact on coaching conversations. We’ve discussed

in prior chapters the benefits of separating coaching and evaluation. That’s

hard to do when the person evaluating you is also the person who coaches

you. Sometimes that’s unavoidable; you can’t have one spouse who coaches

you and another who decides whether to stay married. But when they can

be different people, they should be. It’s best to have a coach who is well

insulated from your compensation and career decisions.

But sometimes your coach is your boss, and there is no getting around it.

In these cases you might be thinking that a “coach the coach” conversation

is off limits: “I’d never talk to my boss about these kinds of things. My boss

determines my future. I can’t suggest that I’m anything less than a

confident, fully competent person.”

Certainly, you should make thoughtful choices about what you are

comfortable discussing in a particular relationship. But talking about

feedback doesn’t require you to reveal everything (or anything) about past

failures. You don’t need to confess, “I was fired from my last two jobs

because I made lots of costly mistakes. Can you help me with that?” You

can say, “I was hired as a big-picture guy, but there are a lot of details that

matter, too. Being more detail oriented is a learning edge for me. It’s helpful

to me if you point things out in real time so I can correct quickly.”

When framing a request for feedback, talk in terms of effectiveness

rather than ambition. Don’t say: “Feedback on running meetings well is

important to me because in five years I see myself as a vice president.”

Likewise, avoid empty generalities: “Feedback on running meetings is

important to me because I think that’s a really important skill in today’s

workplace.” Your request for feedback should always be tied to doing your

current job more effectively: “Feedback on running meetings is important

to me because I want to use the team’s time as efficiently as I can, given the

upcoming merger.” This puts the purpose and payoff in current terms that

actually matter to both of you.

Here’s something else that matters to both of you: Workers who seek out

negative feedback—coaching on what they can improve—tend to receive

higher performance ratings.8 Perhaps showing an interest in learning

doesn’t highlight what you have to learn. It highlights how good you are at

learning it.

DON’T BECOME A GIMME-FEEDBACK FANATIC

Of course, like anything, this can be taken to an extreme. Young Dan caught

the “coach me” bug, and while his earnest thirst for improving was

endearing at first, his repeated requests for feedback quickly became

burdensome. “He wants to sit down to talk about his performance after

every single client meeting,” complained a coworker. “I can’t take much

more of this.”

If you try to draft everyone around you into your personal learning army,

you’re going to produce burnout—and soon find your colleagues going

AWOL. Asking others what they think of you, and how they can help you,

is not the only way to learn. Try asking them questions about themselves:

What do they think about the business problem you’re facing together?

Have they seen a similar problem in the past, and what mistakes have they

seen people make in this situation? What gave them the insight to respond

to the media the way they did this morning? People enjoy talking about

their own thoughts and experiences. By tapping into their wisdom, you can

learn as much as you might by asking for explicit coaching.

YOUR COACH CAN HELP YOU GET IN SYNC

Your coach wasn’t born a coach, and it’s unlikely that they’ve taken

coaching lessons. They’re a longshoreman or a lawyer, just like you. So

they may or may not be comfortable or skilled in the role of coach, and

even the best coaches will have individual strengths and weaknesses.

You might ask your coach what—if anything—they are finding

challenging about the work you’re doing together. Your coach might say:

I can’t always tell what you’re thinking when I give you suggestions.

I’m not sure if you’re agreeing or disagreeing, and whether you feel

like you’re allowed to say so if you disagree.

The firm wants women to have access to a female mentor, and I’m

delighted to be yours. I grew up with three brothers and I have four

sons, so this feels like a learning experience for me, too.

For me, appreciation feels like blowing smoke. I don’t like getting it

and I’ve heard I’m not particularly good at giving it. But I want to be

a good coach, so let’s figure this out.

WHEN THE PERSON BEING COACHED IS THE BOSS

As the years pass and you move up the ladder of success, there will be

fewer people willing to take the risk of giving you candid coaching. You

might get evaluation—market analysts, revenue figures, and the board can

be counted on to provide that. And you might get appreciation—applause

when you get up to speak, gratitude from subordinates who admire your

willingness to give them some time and attention. But genuine, candid

coaching becomes increasingly rare.

Being human, we tend to attribute this slow disappearance of coaching to

our effectiveness and overall mastery. And to be fair, that’s part of what’s

going on. You’re the CEO or COO or C-whatever because you’re good at

what you’re being asked to do, and you’ve been good at it for a long time.

But everyone has shortcomings and weaknesses, and these are more likely

to get in your way as the complexity of what you’re doing grows. You need

help to see your blind spots, which at this stage will not just bite you, but

also hurt the organization.

Even if you’re head of a global bank or playing in the finals at

Wimbledon, you can improve with coaching. We all can. A trusted adviser

can help you think through complex choices or prepare for a potential

backlash.

Some forms of coaching can, in fact, come only from your subordinates.

What do they know that no one else does? They know your impact on them.

When they are in meetings with you, they are also in meetings with your

blind spots. They see the things you do that get in the way, that undermine

your message, that create extra work for them and others. They also hear

from their subordinates what others in the organization think you don’t

understand, don’t pay enough attention to, or aren’t being clear about.

Our subordinates are such a valuable source of information that it’s

astonishing that we don’t tap their knowledge more regularly. It’s like

crawling along in a traffic jam and ignoring the fact that you have a direct

line to the traffic helicopter above—which can see the bigger picture that

you can’t from where you sit. They could give you the lowdown on the hot

spots, pileups, and shortcuts that would get you the farthest fastest.

It’s tough to get information to flow up an organization, and you might

have to do a little hydraulic engineering to get it going. Why? Remember

that most feedback givers are anxious about raising their concerns,

especially upward. They worry that they will jeopardize their relationship

with you—that you will disagree, be annoyed, become defensive, or

retaliate. They also don’t want to hurt your feelings, embarrass you, or

embarrass themselves by handling the exchange badly.

When we show ourselves to be interested in and receptive to suggestions,

it can be enormously refreshing. The boss is self-confident enough to ask

for, and really listen to, feedback. Now, here’s someone I can work with.

You might consider establishing “reverse mentor” relationships, in which

you take on one or several coaches from different levels of the organization

so that you can see the world, and yourself, through their eyes. What does

this organization look like from the factory floor? What does it look like to

the younger generation of workers and customers? What are people worried

about in the Caracas or Calgary or Kuala Lumpur branches, and what do

their customers think of the new global marketing push? You don’t want to

be buffeted by everyone else’s priorities. You do want to learn how your

priorities are and aren’t flowing to the extremities of the organization, and

what unintended effects they are having—so that you can continually work

together to adapt and correct course.

• • •

A final thought on coaching your coach. This may sound immodest coming

from the authors, but it can be useful for you and a colleague or family to

read Thanks for the Feedback together. Not literally at the same time,

reading aloud to each other over cups of cocoa. But you can choose a

particular chapter and then discuss it over lunch or dinner. You don’t need

an agenda, and the conversation doesn’t have to be about anything specific.

Just talk about your thoughts and reactions to what you’ve read. Use the

ideas here as a catalyst for conversation. Pick out a few ideas that make

sense and a few that don’t, and put them up for discussion. Go to our

website, www.stoneandheen.com, and download our Team Leader's

Facilitation Guide, which provides a wealth of questions to stimulate rich

discussion with your team. The guide also offers coaching on how to

facilitate such discussions.

If you’re interested, send an e-mail to the authors. We’ll do our best to

respond. Let us know what’s useful and what’s not. And include a short,

clear description of what an “In and Out Zone” defense looks like, if you’re

able.

INVITE THEM IN

Here’s something we haven’t said: letting someone far enough into your life

to help you transforms the relationship. Not just because you learn, but

because the interaction itself creates connection and shifts both of your

roles inside the relationship. You become someone humble, vulnerable, and

confident enough to ask for help; they become someone who has the

capacity to help and who is respected and appreciated enough to be asked.

In chapter 10 we looked at why being good at setting boundaries is so

crucial. You have to know when and how to keep people out of that

emotional acre of yours. But just as surely, you have to know how to let

them in—whether it’s a well-kept garden or an old junkyard. For many of

us, that’s the real challenge.

Let’s be honest: Everyone’s acre is a mix of garden and junkyard. Your

garden might be messy or manicured, the presentable bits a small plot or

sprawling park. But we all have a few things in the back shed, and we could

all use some help in figuring out what to do with that rusting heap of fears

and those old cartons of shame we trip over regularly. Letting someone in

there, just past the garden, is what takes courage. That’s where intimacy

grows.

How we handle feedback in a relationship has an enormous impact on

that relationship. And changing how we handle feedback can often

transform that relationship. Let’s look at four common variations, where

feedback was out of whack and how letting someone in made a difference.

A GOOD LISTENER ASKS FOR HELP

It wasn’t until a few years ago that Roseanne noticed that her relationships

were lopsided: “People come to me for help. I’m a great listener and good

at helping them. And I enjoy it. But I started to see that all my

conversations were about other people’s problems. I knew what was going

on with everyone else, but not even my closest friends knew what was

going on with me.”

At first she assumed that her friends and colleagues were just self-

absorbed. “But now,” Roseanne says, “I realize that I’m a ‘slow reveal.’ I

don’t easily volunteer information about myself and I never ask for help. I

was sending signals I wasn’t aware of—waving people off, telling them to

stay away.” Roseanne had secured the perimeter with her silence.

Roseanne sat with this realization for months. “I knew that this wasn’t

how I wanted things to be, and I was determined to change. I decided to

work on a very specific skill: I was going to learn how to ask for help. And

for a long time, deciding was as far as I got. It was actually slightly funny.

I’m a person with a million problems, but somehow none of them seemed

like quite the right one to get help with. And anyway, how would I know

who to ask, or what it was I wanted from them? I was so unaccustomed to

getting help that I didn’t know where to start.”

Roseanne finally came up with a strategy. She decided to ask a friend for

help with something she was genuinely lousy at, but which ultimately

wasn’t that important to her: rethinking her wardrobe. “And holy cow, be

careful what you ask for! I hit an artery. It was as if Stacy had been

suppressing her opinions about my appearance for years. ‘No polka dots

after thirty!’ was the first thing she said. And then, ‘Let’s talk about your

hair.’ Apparently, one way to get feedback is to ask.”

Over time, with that friend and others, and even with colleagues at work,

Roseanne started letting people into the less lovely parts of her acre. She

shared some of the scars that lingered from a rough childhood, and her

challenges with committed relationships. Some of the feedback itself has

been more useful than she anticipated. But more important, she is making

deeper connections.

In letting herself be helped she is letting herself be known.

A FRUSTRATED ADVISER OPENS UP

Clay, meanwhile, was having the opposite experience from Roseanne: “A

coworker of mine, Nadine, has a thirteen-year-old son. Bryan is wonderful

in so many ways—a smart, funny, insightful kid. But he has never been

easy. Tantrums like thunderstorms, and recently he’s been turning his anger

on his parents. Nadine and her husband are at a loss for how to cope, but

she doesn’t want any kind of advice. She vents about it and then shuts

down.”

Does Clay have advice? He does. But for as long as he’s known Nadine,

he’s held his tongue: “I don’t have kids and because of that I’ve found that

people aren’t very receptive to my suggestions on that subject. But before I

was a geologist, I worked for several summers at a camp for troubled kids. I

have this sense for what sets kids off and what helps calm them down.

Maybe because I was that kid myself.”

Does Clay’s coworker know this about him? “She does, vaguely,” he

says. “And I’ve even brought it up by saying things like, ‘Oh, yeah, I had a

kid in my cabin who did that,’ but Nadine cruises by it, never following

up.”

If we were coaching Clay as an advice giver, there’s a lot we could offer

him. He could be explicit about what he does and doesn’t know. He could

say: “I do have some ideas for what might help from my work with kids

like Bryan. At the same time, I’m not a parent, and so I don’t have that

perspective.” He could be extra appreciative of the tough work involved in

parenting Bryan and explicit about autonomy—that Nadine is free to take or

leave his ideas: “You’ve worked so hard and maybe you’ve tried these

things. At the end of the day, you know him best. . . .”

But this is a book about feedback receiving. And it turns out that

receiving feedback was just the thing to unlock the Nadine puzzle. Clay did

something he never thought to do before. He asked Nadine for advice. “I

was at dinner at her home,” he says, “and we got on the topic of my

personal life. And for the first time, I described my battles with depression.

It turns out that Nadine knows quite a bit about antidepressant drugs, and so

I was finding the conversation very helpful. And then out of nowhere, in

this conversation about me, she started talking about Bryan. She described a

recent episode, and then listened intently as I shared my theory about what

might be going on with him. It was literally the first time we’ve ever

discussed it, and she was like a sponge.”

There’s a coda to this story, as Clay explains: “We’ve talked about it

since, this question of being open to advice. And this blew my mind. She

had suspected I’d struggled with depression in my life, and felt like she

knew things that would help me, but always thought I was uncomfortable

talking about it. So she was having the same experience I was of feeling

uninvited to offer help. Wrap your mind around that.” Indeed.

PERFECT FEEDBACK FOR THE PERFECT PERSON

Fiona founded and runs a community health center in Kenya. For ten years

she’s been working around the clock to build partnerships, expand services,

and train new staff. She is liked and respected in the region; people come

from across Africa to learn about her community outreach model.

Recently Fiona has started to feel restless, and as new opportunities arise,

she finds herself with a surprising problem: Despite working hard to train

her staff, she has not groomed anyone who could take over the organization

if she departed.

Once she became aware of this hole in her planning, she set about in her

usual competent way to tackle it. She made lists of skills that that person

would need and started to devise strategies for how current staff might

acquire them. She also began investigating where she might find new

employees who might already be qualified for the role.

And then a friend from another health center asked Fiona: “What are you

doing that is disabling your staff from learning?” The implication was clear:

After ten years, you should already have at least a couple of people with the

know-how to run the center. Fiona was offended: “Disable my staff? Are

you kidding?” She pointed to all the training and mentoring she had done.

But the question stuck with her, needling and nudging. So one day she

went to a junior staffer she knew was capable and observant and asked not

whether she was hindering others, but how: “What do you see me doing

that disables the staff?”

It turned out that Fiona—like many entrepreneurs—had her fingerprints

on everything. In the early days this ensured quality control and consistent

messaging. As the organization grew, however, her need to oversee, to

direct, to manage, meant that no one could decide anything without her say-

so. Staffers couldn’t make their own mistakes and never learned to take

initiative or trust their own judgment.

The feedback required some tough self-examination on Fiona’s part, as

well as a number of additional conversations inside the organization. There

were three results: Fiona learned to step back and trust her staff with more

responsibilities. Her relationships with her staff members were strengthened

enough to make that easier to do. And finally, Fiona demonstrated that no

one is perfect, not even Fiona. And that allowed everyone to loosen up, step

up, and learn from mistakes more easily.

SHIFTING MIRRORS

Amy was just scolded by her boss. In front of others, on a conference call.

Again.

She hangs up and immediately dials Hank, her best friend since the time

they worked together as night managers at a chain of grocery stores. Amy is

now the manager of a rival supermarket across town, and Hank has

remained a trusted sounding board. He has heard plenty over the last few

months about Amy’s new regional boss and chief antagonist, Ivan.

The latest is this: Ivan had scheduled an early call for the store managers

in the region to discuss a change in shipping providers. Amy was a few

minutes late dialing in, and when she clicked into the call, she caught Ivan

mid-sentence saying, “. . . Amy, late as usual.”

“He just has it in for me,” Amy tells Hank. “It’s so unprofessional. There

were eighteen people on that call who got to hear his little put-down.”

Later on the call they clashed again when Ivan explained that the new

shipper would require authorized personnel to sign for produce. Amy

pointed out that their other produce suppliers already required signatures.

“Not true,” Ivan corrected. “Not until now, but we’ll need signatures from

now on. Everyone should arrange to sign for their produce deliveries.”

Amy continues with Hank: “So I told Ivan that I would forward the list

of signers I already use. I just wanted to let him know that, obviously, we

already had a list. And then, as if I couldn’t hear, he said, ‘I guess Amy

really wants to be right.’ It’s as if Ivan can’t stop himself. He’s the most

defensive person I’ve ever met, but doesn’t think twice about offending

anyone else.” Hank listens thoughtfully, and says “yeah” and “wow” every

once in a while.

When he hangs up, Hank wonders if he could have done more to help

Amy hear the feedback.

We Triangulate for Comfort, but Not Coaching

Amy is doing what we all do when upset by criticism—she’s reaching out

for support. Venting is natural and cathartic; turning the sting of the moment

into the latest “get this” story for friends and coworkers helps us connect

with others and regain our balance.

But too often we stop there. We ask our friends to be supportive mirrors

so that we can get recentered and feel better. But we miss the opportunity to

also ask them to help us sift the feedback itself for anything we might learn.

Of course, from Amy’s point of view, Ivan’s actions didn’t constitute

feedback; he was simply being a jerk. But extracting feedback from

jerkiness is just the kind of thing friends can help you do.

Hank Has a Hunch

Later that afternoon Amy calls Hank back. She thanks him for being

supportive earlier, and then makes a request: “I can usually see where

people are coming from, but with Ivan, there’s something going on that I

don’t get. I don’t know if I push his buttons or if he’s just this way with

everyone. I need you to help me with that.” She’d like Hank to shift from

supportive mirror to honest mirror.

Amy’s instinct is sound: In the conflict between Amy and Ivan, Hank

actually does see both sides. He gets why Amy was triggered by Ivan’s

comments. But he’s had his own experiences with Amy’s wanting to be

right, and Hank wonders if this is a blind spot for her. Just because Ivan is

difficult doesn’t mean Amy is not.

Hank observes that this isn’t the first time that she and Ivan have clashed

over “who is right.” He sees a pattern: It’s not just that Ivan is triggering

Amy—Amy is also triggering Ivan. “That’s true,” Amy admits. “But I’m

not just going to act as if he’s right when he’s not, especially if he’s making

comments about me being wrong in front of other people.”

She pauses and then adds this: “You know, there was one other thing

going on that I didn’t mention.” When Amy overheard Ivan’s comment

about her being “late as usual” she remained civil on the phone. But she

couldn’t resist sending him a text while the conference call rattled on about

trucking and signatures:

Amy: Late? 2 minutes.

Ivan: 5.

Amy: Was dealing with shopper’s complaint.

Ivan: Don’t care. Don’t be late.

Amy: 2 minutes. Maybe 3.

Returning to the call, Ivan and Amy pick up their repartee, this time about

signatures and past produce practice, and again, Amy can’t seem to sense

when the argument has passed its expiration date.

Hank suggests that maybe there’s something to this idea that Amy likes

to have the last word, and that this is contributing to the Amy-Ivan

conflicts. (Of course, that very instinct shows up in her conversation with

Hank: “But just so you know, I really was only two minutes late,” she adds

before they hang up.)

Make Two Lists to Stay on Track

In his effort to be an honest mirror, Hank suggests that they make two lists

—what’s wrong with the feedback, and what might be right or helpful

(which is a version of the containment chart we include in chapter 8). Each

time Amy strays back to defending or pointing out the problems with Ivan’s

approach, Hank tells her to write it down in the “what’s wrong” column. He

then guides her back to what might be right.

Here’s a sample of the notes Amy took on her napkin:

Writing down and discussing what’s wrong frees Amy to see what might

be right or valid or reasonable. The two sides of the list don’t net each other

out, and the point isn’t for Amy to reach some grand conclusion about her

interactions with Ivan, or a verdict on who was more right or more to

blame. Amy is digging to learn—about herself and about her relationship

with Ivan. That way, when she approaches Ivan with her thoughts, she’ll

have a more balanced view of what’s going on, and a better sense of what

might help improve the situation.

• • •

Feedback isn’t just about the quality of the advice or the accuracy of the

assessments. It’s about the quality of the relationship, your willingness to

show that you don’t have it all figured out, and to bring your whole self—

flaws, uncertainties, and all—into the relationship.

PULL TOGETHER

Feedback in Organizations

The supply chain manager for a sheet metal company, Everett likes data.

So he was surprised when he received a load of data in his 360 report

that he did not like. The information was confounding, wildly out of line

with how he saw himself. He felt defensive—for himself and in the name of

good data everywhere. The whole feedback endeavor, he told anyone who

would listen, had been poorly executed and pointless.

And then one day—wham!—it hit him. “The feedback fell into place,”

he says. “I suddenly saw myself in a new way, and it explained so many

things. Oh, this is why I’ve been struggling; this is where I’ve been wrong;

this is what has been disrupting my marriage; this is where I can change.”

Everett now supports 360s with the zeal of the converted: “It’s the only way

to get successful but stubborn son of a guns like me to look at themselves.”

But many of his colleagues disagree. Some found their 360 useful, but

not overwhelmingly enlightening. Some found it unhelpful, and a few felt it

was destructive. Everett finds this attitude regrettable: “No performance

management system is perfect, but ours is really quite good. Too many of

our top people are complacent. Or maybe they’re just afraid to do the hard

work of growing.”

Pierre is also wrestling with his company’s performance management

system. The president of a retail clothing chain, Pierre took stock of the toll

the system was taking on his employees: It absorbed an excessive amount

of time and left people feeling demoralized and unfairly treated. “Most of

the people who work here are amazing,” he observes. “But the system we

had in place was just not working. Everyone found it stressful. And

performance issues that needed to be addressed still didn’t get addressed.

We’ve been searching for a better way but haven’t found it yet.” Pierre

eventually canceled performance reviews altogether. Threw out the whole

thing.

Pierre thinks the people are good but the system is broken; Everett thinks

the system is good but the people are broken.

THERE ARE NO PERFECT FEEDBACK SYSTEMS

As far as “broken people” are concerned, the first twelve chapters of this

book explore just how hard it is for any of us to be perfect learners. Simply

being human provides a lifetime’s worth of challenges when it comes to

seeing ourselves clearly, managing our emotional reactions, and changing

long-standing habits. Can people learn and change? Sure. Is it difficult for

each and every one of us to do so? You bet.

Just as there are no perfect learning people, there are no perfect

organizational feedback systems. There are better and worse systems that

are more and less well matched to the needs of any given organization. But

anyone choosing and implementing a particular system must grapple with

the inevitable tensions and tradeoffs associated with it.

For example, any system that is applied to an organization larger than a

few people is going to run into the problem of differences in temperament.

The system will be well suited to some, adequately suited to others, and

poorly suited to at least a few. And, inevitably, it will be implemented by

some managers who are relatively good at feedback and some who aren’t.

So we will never have ideal execution or full buy-in, and the buy-in

challenge can form a reinforcing downward cycle. That guy’s not putting

any time into this, so why should I?

Feedback givers in any system too often see big cost and little benefit.

Lucinda, who works in pharmaceutical research, is clear about this: “It

takes time away from my primary tasks, and there’s no reward or

acknowledgment for doing it well.”

And she’s unsure how to assess her subordinates. She knows that they

are not all top performers, but is worried about the costs to morale of

negative evaluations: “If I score my people on the rigorous scale we’ve

been given, many of them are going to be disheartened. In a tight labor

market, I can’t afford to lose any of the talent I’ve got, or to erode the

performance we’ve achieved. So while forcing me to differentiate this

starkly might make things fair across the organization, for me and my team,

there’s only downside. And from what I hear, other managers aren’t paying

any attention to the scale anyway. If I did use it, it would be like penalizing

people just for being on my team.”

Jim feels caught by the performance system at the park service, for a

different reason. He’s a team leader for search and rescue, where

performance is critical to survival. “I’ve put in the time to recruit and select

the best people,” he explains. “If I’ve got the wrong person out there in a

blizzard, it’s dangerous for everyone. I’ve only got A players, because

unlike some of my fellow managers, I’ve already done the work of having

the hard conversations and making the tough calls. A ‘forced curve’

punishes me for managing well.”

CAN’T LIVE WITH IT, CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT IT

From where Jim and Lucinda stand, their feedback systems look pretty

flawed: It’s risky for any individual manager to give fully honest reviews. If

handled poorly by either giver or receiver, such conversations can damage

trust, working relationships, motivation, and team cohesion.

But then again, it’s risky not to. Problems fester, the manager and the

system lose credibility, the team underperforms, and high performers resent

that low performers aren’t pulling their weight yet face no consequences.

Managers feel stuck, and avoidance is ubiquitous. Recall that 63 percent

of executives surveyed say their biggest challenge to effective performance

management is that their managers lack courage to have the difficult

performance discussions.1 They give artificially high reviews to even

mediocre employees, which dilutes the usefulness of reviews for addressing

performance or guiding decision making. In one organization 96 percent of

employees received the highest rating.2 And researcher Brené Brown

observes that a lack of meaningful feedback was the number-one reason

cited by talented people for leaving an organization.3

It’s easy to complain about the system and the people who populate it.

What’s hard is to figure out what would help, especially because of the vast

range of goals that performance systems are charged with accomplishing:

Providing consistent evaluation across roles, functions, and

regions;

Ensuring fair compensation and distribution of rewards;

Incenting positive behaviors and disciplining negative

behaviors;

Communicating clear expectations;

Increasing accountability;

Aligning individuals with organizational goals and vision;

Coaching and developing individual and team performance;

Helping to get and retain the right people in the right roles;

Assisting succession planning in key leadership positions;

Promoting job satisfaction and high morale; and

Getting it done on time—in the moment, quarterly, annually.

Accomplishing all of these goals can’t be done with a single system or even

with a combination of systems.

The trend has been to centralize and standardize systems, collecting data

on metrics across employees, functions, regions, and markets. This can be

helpful, but you can’t “metric” your way around the fact that feedback is a

relationship-based, judgment-laced process. As Dick Grote observes in

“The Myth of Performance Metrics,” you can’t evaluate the performance of

a language translator simply by counting the number of pages he translates.4

You have to make judgments about the quality of the translation—its

success in capturing nuance, meaning, and tone. In addition, as we’ve

explored here, the feedback lives (or dies) amid the trust, credibility,

relationship, and communications skills between giver and receiver.

So there are no easy answers. But we assert this: Systems will always be

imperfect. We should work to improve them, but that can only take us so

far. The greatest leverage is helping the people inside the system

communicate more effectively, and as between giver and receiver, it’s the

receiver’s skills that have the most impact. We need to equip receivers to

create pull—to drive their own learning, to seek honest mirrors as well as

supportive mirrors, to speak up when they need additional appreciation or

coaching or are confused about where they stand. As each receiver becomes

more skilled at receiving—at creating pull—the organization gets better at

it, too. We pull together.

• • •

Below, we consider this challenge—of imperfect people within imperfect

systems—and offer ideas for improvement from three different

organizational perspectives: leadership and HR, team leaders and coaches,

and receivers.

WHAT LEADERSHIP AND HR CAN DO

We’ll start with leadership and HR, since they’re the ones we expect to “do

something” about the problem of performance management. They’re not

the only players, but they’re the most visible and the most likely to have

their hands in the design. Here are three things they can do that help.

1. DON’T JUST TRUMPET BENEFITS, EXPLAIN TRADEOFFS

The task of implementing and championing a performance management

system usually falls to Human Resources.5

Because these systems are so often and so easily criticized, HR leaders

struggle to supply the positive side of the argument: “What’s even better

than Focused Friday and Work Hard Wednesday? The new performance

system!” But that advocacy has unintended consequences in that it causes

the roles in the debate to harden: HR and senior management are the

cheerleaders. Everyone else is a sneerleader. And as HR sends out more

positive messages, the complainers feel obligated to send out more negative

ones.

Of course, HR and senior leadership are acutely aware of the real

challenges. One survey found that, privately, within senior HR forums, only

3 percent of HR leaders give their own performance management system an

A; 58 percent give their system a C, D, or F.6 They know the challenges

better than anyone else, but it’s just not their role to talk about those

challenges publicly.

Our advice is this: Don’t just promote benefits. Also discuss and explain

tradeoffs. Here’s an illustration of why that matters from a client we met a

few years back. Jane, the new head of HR, was hired to fix the

organization’s performance management system. Jane’s predecessor had

tried to implement a new system, but after a year of work, the executive

committee voted it down and the predecessor left the organization.

Then Jane came on board and examined what her predecessor had

sketched out. Jane decided that her top priority would be not just adopting a

new performance evaluation system, but adopting the exact system that had

been proposed by her predecessor and rejected by the exco. Jane’s assistant

asked why she was going to the trouble: If you’re trying to get fired, why

not just post scandalous pictures of yourself on Facebook? It’s easier and

much more fun.

But Jane had a plan. She called a meeting of the executive committee and

began her presentation by stating that she wanted the group to take a second

look at the system that had been voted down the previous year. No one was

pleased by this suggestion, but when Jane added, “I want to make a list of

all of its drawbacks,” there was at least the possibility of some amusement.

The exco commenced their critique, and the list grew, with Jane adding a

few drawbacks of her own. When the list was complete, she read each item

out loud and concluded with this: “Wow.” After a pause Jane added: “These

are serious drawbacks. No wonder you voted this system down.” This was

met with some grumbling: Did she not realize that the plan had flaws until

just now? This is the person we hired to fix the problem?

Then Jane said: “Now let’s make a list of the benefits of the plan.” The

process started slowly but soon gained momentum. Again, she finished by

reading each item out loud; several items pointed to the benefits of the

proposed new system compared with the current one or with other systems

the exco was aware of. When she finished she paused and said: “Serious

drawbacks and important benefits.” And added: “We’ve looked at many

other performance management systems. Every system has its drawbacks.

The plan we’re looking at now has the fewest drawbacks, and also the most

important benefits, given our goals and what we’re up against. We should

adopt it because it’s by far the best fit for us. The minute something better

comes along, you can be sure I’ll grab it.”

The plan passed unanimously. The conversation took about forty-five

minutes. When asked what had caused the executive committee to reverse

its decision from the previous year, one member remarked, “Last year we

were presented only with the benefits of the plan. This year we discussed

the drawbacks.”

Funny reasoning, maybe, yet it’s exactly right. When we are asked to

make a choice about a subject we’re worried about, and we are presented

only with the benefits, we supply the potential drawbacks on our own—

some real and some imagined. And then we construct an imaginary way

out: Why accept a plan with so many drawbacks when we could accept a

plan with no drawbacks? Let’s use that one.

Jane found a way to bring the internal voices of the committee members

—their fears and concerns—into the room, so they could be weighed and

assessed. When you do this, it could be that the drawbacks do outweigh the

benefits, but at least people can now evaluate the real choices involved. We

aren’t choosing between this and some fantasy plan yet to be discovered;

we’re choosing between this plan and other comparable plans that have

both benefits and drawbacks.

In general, when selecting or implementing an organizational system, HR

and senior leaders should provide the following to employees at all levels of

the organization:

Clarification of the various goals of the system;

An explanation of why this system was chosen over other

systems;

Transparency about potential costs as well as benefits;

A description of the costs of half-hearted participation; and

An invitation for ongoing discussion, suggestions, and

feedback.

When handling complaints or concerns about the system, make sure to

listen and acknowledge. Ask for specific suggestions that might improve

the system. If you decide to reject an idea that’s been proposed, it’s crucial

to explain why: “We discussed it at length. It fixes this problem over here,

but creates this other problem over there. On balance, we decided not to

implement it.” If you don’t explain why, people assume you didn’t fully

understand the benefits of their suggestions, were just going through the

motions of asking for input, or don’t care about their concerns or well-

being.

HR can streamline the process, but in the end, the dilemmas and time

crunch created by having to give and receive feedback are a shared

problem, not an HR problem. Sharing the problem can generate new ideas,

but it also shifts the roles from the standard oppressor-victim dynamic to

that of mutual problem solvers.

Ismail, fed up with the state of feedback in his firm, decided to “share the

dilemma.” He called an all-hands meeting and laid it on the line: “I hear

people complaining they don’t get enough feedback. I hear people

complaining they don’t like the feedback they do get. Employees blame

managers, and managers blame employees. Everybody blames HR. We’ve

put in the best systems we know on evaluation and mentoring, but let’s

admit the truth: They’re not perfect, and they never will be. No system can

make you learn, but no system can keep you from learning either. So the

best way forward is for each of us to ask ourselves: What kind of learner do

I want to be, and what kind of mentor do I want to be? We’re in it together:

If you support me in my learning, I’ll support you in yours.”

Ismail’s honesty helped people to see that this was not an administrative

problem, but a human problem. He got people involved and talking—not

just about the challenges but about taking responsibility for their own

learning and for creating possible solutions.

Obviously you can’t have everyone who works in an organization

involved in designing and implementing feedback systems. But you can

invite participation, both formal and informal. It’s often useful to invite

those who are the loudest voices against performance systems to be part of

the process of designing them, both to take advantage of their perspective

and ideas, and to enroll them in the challenge of doing something

constructive about their complaints.

2. SEPARATE APPRECIATION, COACHING, AND EVALUATION

A single performance management system can’t effectively communicate

all three kinds of feedback. Each requires different qualities and different

settings to be effective.

Evaluation needs to be fair, consistent, clear, and predictable—across

individuals, teams, and divisions. We need to understand who is evaluating

whom and what the criteria for success and advancement are. We’ll need to

have thoughtful two-way conversations throughout the year about goals and

progress, in time to address problems along the way. The evaluation system

needs to be rigid enough to ensure fairness and consistency, yet flexible

enough to take account of individual differences in role and circumstance.

None of this is new and none of this is easy.

Good coaching requires different parameters to work well. Those who

are improving need frequent, close-to-real-time suggestions, and the chance

to practice small corrections or improvements along the way. The “one big

coaching meeting each year with twenty suggestions” or even “two

coaching meetings each year with ten suggestions each” isn’t likely to help,

because at its core, coaching is a relationship, not a meeting. Coach and

coachee need ongoing discussion of what the coachee can work on in light

of organizational needs and individual competencies. They need people

who can be honest mirrors to help them see themselves when they’re not at

their best, and supportive mirrors to reassure them that they can get better.

As we’ve discussed, there are at least two problems in mixing coaching

with evaluation. First, on the receiving end, my attention will be drawn to

the evaluation, which drowns out the coaching. If I think I have lost the

bonus I already promised my family, I’m not going to hear your suggestions

for how I can tweak my PowerPoint slides. The second concern is that, if I

am going to be open to coaching, I need to feel safe.7 I need to know that

admitting mistakes or areas of weakness isn’t going to count against me in

my job security or career advancement. I need absolute trust that being open

in coaching conversations will not adversely affect my evaluation.

Finally, as we’ve said, too many workplaces suffer from mutual

appreciation deficit disorder. Even the most satisfied among us can

sometimes feel underappreciated for how much we put into our jobs and for

how much crap we put up with along the way. Formal recognition programs

are helpful, but we care more about appreciation from our immediate

coworkers and supervisors than we do about ceremonial recognition from

seven levels above. Rote thank-yous lose currency fast, but an authentic

“Hey, watching you handle that complicated task so well is making me

rethink my approach to those problems” can mean more than any plaque or

gift certificate.

And everyone hears appreciation in different ways.8 Some hear it in their

paycheck, and are baffled why others need more than that to feel valued.

Others hear it in a private word of affirmation or handwritten note of

thanks, in the patience a mentor shows as she goes over the skill yet again,

or in the juicy assignment sent their way. The point here is not that you

have to have an “appreciation system” in place; rather, it’s about having a

cultural norm of appreciation that encourages everyone to notice (1) the

genuine and unique positives in the work of others, and (2) how each team

member hears appreciation and encouragement so that it can be best

expressed to that person as an individual.

The responsibility to get the balance right on all three kinds of feedback

ultimately lies with both givers and receivers. Sara, a first-year consultant,

found that she was getting plenty of hard-hitting coaching, but had no sense

of where she stood. That vacuum meant she struggled not to hear the

coaching as evaluation. “I couldn’t tell if I was on track, which made all this

mid-project coaching from partners feel like stepping in front of a firing

squad every time. Finally, I decided to ask. I said to the partner, ‘Before you

give me your coaching, can you tell me how you think I’m doing? Am I on

track based on where I should be at this stage?’ He was surprised: ‘Sara,

you’re doing great! You’ve definitely got a future here—do you not realize

that?’ I didn’t, but the minute he said it, I could relax and focus on his

coaching. And now that I could hear his coaching as coaching, it was really

quite helpful.”

3. PROMOTE A CULTURE OF LEARNERS

In every organization explicit and implicit messages evolve about what is

(actually) valued and what is (actually) rewarded. If you want “learning” to

be valued, it has to be embedded in what is talked about with admiration,

what is highlighted as important in the war stories that are told, what

matters when it comes to visible projects and key promotions.

Here are five ideas that help promote a culture of learning.

Highlight Learning Stories

The most visible picture of competence in many organizations is the

superstar with God-given talent who delivers consistent results and, with a

bit of luck and the right relationships, rises quickly through the ranks. But

the reality is often different from the myth. In fact, what many of these

superstars are actually doing well is learning.

God-given talent is the way her peers tell the story of Sijia. She’s

attractive, bright, and likable, gets put on the best projects, and is soon

included in more senior meetings. Among her colleagues her swift rise is

seen as the result of her natural gifts and her skill at playing the political

game.

But her colleagues are missing a key part of the story. What they don’t

see is that Sijia is a proactive and determined learner. She pays attention to

what she doesn’t comprehend and asks questions. She asks if she can sit in

on meetings that will help her understand the customer better, and as a

consequence, she gets to observe firsthand how people above her play their

roles. Sijia’s openness to coaching is evident. She doesn’t present herself as

perfect; in fact, she’s quick to acknowledge her mistakes and what she’s

learned from them. No one thinks Sijia has all the answers, but her senior

colleagues increasingly see her as a trusted partner in tackling the toughest

challenges.

Unfortunately her organization isn’t fully capitalizing on Sijia’s skill at

learning. As she moves up, there is no encouragement for her to share her

learning approach, and no one in management has done it either. So her

peers and younger colleagues attribute her success to luck and

brownnosing, failing to observe (or emulate) her single greatest asset.

Part of what defines an organizational culture are the stories and myths

about it—the courage or genius or endurance displayed in the face of

impossible challenges. These stories tell us what kind of place we work at

and what is expected of us. “Mistake stories” that ultimately result in “what

we learned” stories are abundant—probably every successful employee and

team has some—but they are too rarely shared.

Cultivate Growth Identities

If you want to nudge people out of a fixed identity and into a growth

identity, two things help. First, teach them about it. A “growth identity” is

not a concept most people are aware of until they hear about it. Hold a

session on the difference between fixed and growth identities; let people

discuss the topic, ask questions, express doubt. Talk about the differences in

how people metabolize positive and negative feedback, and the implications

for how to coach one another on teams. Float the concept of honest and

supportive mirrors, and get the grapevine to actually grow something

beyond rumors—peers helping one another to see their blind spots and

process feedback for what’s right, not just venting about what’s wrong. Get

the ideas into the air and onto people’s radar.

Second, make the challenge of “pull”—the work required to recognize

our triggers and find a way to learn—discussable during feedback

conversations. People get better as they practice, and they can practice more

productively when both people in the conversation are aware of feedback

challenges. Discussing reactions to feedback, confusion, defensiveness,

blind spots, and interpretations regarding where the feedback is coming

from and going—these should all be part of everyday conversations on how

to do things well.

It’s important, though, that “growth identity” not be used by feedback

givers as a way to shortcut a conversation: “You’re not taking my feedback

because you don’t have a growth identity.” A growth identity provides a

way of hearing the feedback. It doesn't mean you always take it.

Discuss Second Scores

In chapter 9 we suggested developing a second score that looks at how you

deal with challenging feedback. You may not have been happy with your

evaluation, or the project you were on may have failed, but we’re especially

interested in how you responded to that experience. That’s what tells us

what you’re capable of as the challenges naturally get harder and the

environment you have to navigate gets more complex.

We recommend against actually “giving” people formal second scores.

(Now they are worried about your evaluation of my reaction to your first

evaluation.) But we do urge you to discuss the challenge and importance of

second scores. A feedback giver can encourage a receiver to reflect not only

on the feedback itself but on how and what he’s doing with it—to reflect on

how to maximize his second score.

Create Multitrack Feedback

In foreign affairs the concept of multitrack diplomacy describes the range of

players who are involved in creating systemic change and building peace.

Track 1 is the official government track—involved in negotiations,

summits, sanctions, and treaties. Track 2 is the unofficial but often

significant work done by others—community members and grassroots

organizations, et cetera.9

We’ve borrowed this concept to describe the two tracks that

organizations can put in place to support individual learning. They need to

have Track 1 structures that support evaluation and mentoring. Those

include performance management systems, mentoring programs, trainings,

and the like.

But in many ways Track 2 activities are even more crucial to learning.

These include the informal coaching conversations among friends, peers,

and mentors; the stories of success and failure; discussions of best practices

and skills that did or didn’t help; and even an exchange of favorite books.

You might have honest mirror and supportive mirror lunches with friends,

combining social time with helping each other to learn.

Track 2 gives a formal name to these important informal interactions,

and that helps you talk about it and bring it more consciously into the

culture of the organization.

Leverage Positive Social Norming

The least appealing part of performance management for everyone involved

is the phase called Nagging and Being Nagged. Setting goals, coaching, and

completing appraisals are responsibilities that usually sit alongside the more

pressing tasks already on everyone’s plates, and are often the first to get

postponed in the face of more immediate crises. So it falls to HR or team

leaders to nag, and to managers and employees to be nagged.

Work by Robert Cialdini suggests we may be going about the whole

process wrong. Cialdini is an expert on influence, and he argues that talking

about negative behavior often has the unintended effect of reinforcing it as

the social norm. If I’m a manager getting chiding e-mails about my late

appraisals, I have two reactions. First, I feel underappreciated for all the

hard work I’m doing that is the reason my appraisals are late. I’m not

hanging around in my (apparently spacious) cubicle playing Ping-Pong. I’m

swamped with a thousand different projects that the organization needs me

to do.

But second, based on the tone of the nagging e-mail, I gather there must

be quite a few of us who are late. I figure I’m in good company. If my bad

behavior is the social norm, I don’t feel particularly moved to take this

reminder very seriously. I’ll just get another reminder in a week or so, along

with everyone else. That seems to be how it works around here.

Interestingly, it’s when the reminders stop that I might worry I’ve missed

the expected “window” of grace.

Cialdini’s studies demonstrate that highlighting good norms does more to

change disliked behavior than calling out bad norms. Rather than issuing a

reproachful “31 percent of you still haven’t completed your reviews” it’s

more effective to crow, “69 percent of you have completed your reviews.

Thank you!” Those who have completed the task feel appreciated and

recognized for the effort. And those who haven’t get the message that they

are out of step with their peers.10

WHAT TEAM LEADERS AND FEEDBACK GIVERS CAN DO

What can one manager or team leader do to improve an organizational

culture?

An organizational culture is really a collection of subcultures, and those

subcultures can vary tremendously from manager to manager, team to team,

and department to department. You can have significant impact on your

own subculture and teammates, and over time, you can invite others to join

you. Here are three ideas that help.

1. MODEL LEARNING, REQUEST COACHING

If you had to pick between preaching the benefits of being a learner and

modeling good learning, well, there’s no contest. In many ways, the

manager is the culture: If they’re good learners, they set the tone for a

learning culture.

The first step in modeling learning, of course, is actually being a good

learner. That’s the hard part for all of us. Compared with that, the next step

is easy but often forgotten: make your endeavor to learn explicit. Encourage

people to discuss your blind spots with you. Shift from blame conversations

to joint contribution conversations, and start by asking what you might have

contributed to the problem. Hold people accountable by showing them how

you hold yourself accountable alongside them. When you conduct

performance reviews, help people look at the system and their role in it, and

appreciate them for their engagement and efforts to change. Be open about

what you continue to find challenging about receiving feedback. Ask for

coaching and help, not only from those above you, but from peers and

subordinates. All things we’ve talked about elsewhere, but we say them

again here because modeling is the most powerful thing you can do as an

individual leader to improve the culture.

2. AS GIVERS, MANAGE YOUR OWN MINDSET AND IDENTITY

Consider the situation Janice is in. Although she has terrific technical skills

and a file stuffed with glowing reviews, she’s been passed over for

promotion into management time and time again. She is confused and

increasingly resentful. Why is she being treated so unfairly? The politics

around this place are ridiculous.

Janice’s supervisor, Ricky, knows that she is not being treated unfairly;

she simply doesn’t have the requisite skills. She is not being promoted

because there are well-founded concerns—from Ricky and others—about

her ability to manage people. But fearing he would upset her, Ricky has

never given Janice this feedback directly. She can’t change what she’s not

aware of. In Ricky’s well-intended effort to avoid hurting Janice, he is

hurting her and holding back her career. And that’s treating her unfairly.

Ricky reminds us why managers dread feedback conversations as much

as employees do. Givers can struggle with identity issues of their own:

“I’m not good at giving feedback. That’s obvious when I try.”

“If they disagree or are upset with me, I must not be a good

manager.”

“They won’t like me.”

“I don’t want them to think I’m being controlling or ‘telling them how

to do their job’ (despite the fact that somebody obviously needs to).”

“I’m a nice person. I don’t want to hurt their feelings or appear

unsupportive.”

Perhaps the most common concern is the last: Hurting someone,

regardless of our intentions, conflicts with our self-image as a good and

kind person, or a supportive leader. It’s true that the receiver needs the

feedback: they are long-winded, unresponsive, exude “attitude,” or smell

bad. Yet raising these concerns makes most of us squirm. Even if it’s done

in the execution of our role, it feels horrible to hurt or upset others, and we

quite reasonably try to avoid it when we can.

Our advice is to notice that what might hurt someone in the short term

might help them in the longer term, and indeed, withholding important

coaching because it might be painful—to them and to us—can do them real

damage over time. We all need empathy and encouragement—supportive

mirrors. But we also need clear and accurate information—honest mirrors.

When we ourselves are screwing up or shooting ourselves in the foot, we

want someone to tell us. Yet we hesitate to tell others. As you think about

whether and how to give feedback, make sure to factor in the long-term

consequences for the receiver as well as your own short-term identity

discomfort.

3. BE AWARE OF HOW INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES COLLIDE IN ORGANIZATIONS

Part of the challenge of feedback in organizations is due to differences of

temperament and wiring; we all have different baselines, swing, and sustain

and recovery. For simplicity, let’s assume that in any given population,

about half the staff tend to be optimistic, quick-recovery Krista types from

chapter 7, and half are Alita types, who swing wide in response to negative

feedback and take longer to recover.

Now, just for fun, pair them all up to give each other feedback.

Our sensitivity to feedback can affect not only how we receive feedback

but also how we give it. If a manager is highly sensitive to negative

feedback, he may not be comfortable giving negative feedback to others; he

may assume they’ll have the same painful overreactions that he does.

Which may be true. Or not. If you matched an Alita type, who hates

critical feedback, with a Krista type, who can’t hear critical feedback unless

it’s extremely explicit, nothing may get communicated. Alita’s fear of

hurting Krista results in her hinting around, which, rather than sparing

Krista’s feelings, only frustrates her. Krista is happiest with clarity. Krista’s

former manager used to address problems by saying to her: “Do not EVER

do that again.” Krista loved this. She got it. No harm, just help.

But now think about what happens when the Krista types give the Alita

types critical feedback. Krista may be oblivious to how sensitive Alita is.

Her tough, direct feedback aimed at helping Alita improve—“These three

things? Never do them again”—may devastate Alita, setting her back rather

than helping her grow. In Krista’s mind, her unvarnished approach is no big

deal—just giving a little advice. But for Alita, it’s scarring. No help, just

harm.

If Alita approaches Krista about how upsetting this is for her, their

tendencies replicate themselves in this next exchange. Alita would be

tentative and vague in describing the real extent of the devastation caused

by Krista’s harshness. Krista wouldn’t hear something this indirect, and

would brush it off with a “Buck up, kid” or “Don’t take it so personally” or

“Sorry, were you saying something?” Krista doesn’t see a problem, and is

shocked when Alita jumps ship to a competitor six months later: “But I

invested so much in her development!”

Of course, there are other variations on the theme of how disposition

affects our style of giving feedback. People who worry a lot often give an

abundance of feedback as a way to gain a sense of control over their

environment. People who have impossibly high standards for themselves

can also hold impossibly high standards for others, resulting in a steady

stream of coaching and negative evaluation, and a conspicuous silence

around appreciation. And people who have trouble with impulse control are

often “direct” in ways that are sometimes helpful and sometimes less so. All

these variations can result in individuals with the unexpected combination

of being insensitive as givers while being hypersensitive as receivers. This

is why when you are a giver, asking your receiver to coach you as their

coach is so important.

WHAT RECEIVERS CAN DO

A few final words for receivers as we work to adapt to the organization,

community, and family we live in. First, a reminder: Regardless of context

or the company you keep, you are the most important person in your own

learning. Your organization or team or boss might support or stifle

feedback. Either way, they can’t stop you from learning. You don’t have to

depend on your annual review or your boss’s willingness to mentor. You

can watch, ask questions, and solicit suggestions from coworkers,

customers, partners, and friends. You don’t have to wait around for

someone to train you to sell more shoes. Observe whoever sells the most

and try to figure out what they’re doing differently. And ask them to watch

you. Whatever they suggest, try it on. Experiment with the advice, and if

the shoe fits, wear it.

Whatever you do in your organization—whether it’s selling shoes or

saving souls—you’re surrounded by people you can learn from.

• • •

Like the tension between learning and acceptance for each of us as

individuals, the tensions at the heart of organizational feedback are a

permanent condition. The ideas in this chapter and in the rest of the book

can help us manage these tensions, and get us talking to one another.

But while learning is a shared responsibility, in the end, it comes down to

you.

Rockwell Family Entities, Norman Rockwell Museum Collections.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

If you want an extra helping of criticism in your life, tell people you are

writing a book about how to receive feedback.

Typical comments to Sheila sounded like this: “Interesting. Remember

your wedding day?” Yes, twenty years ago? “Well anyway, I always thought

your dress was . . .” Comments to Doug tended in this direction: “Wait, you

are writing a book about receiving feedback? That’s a little ironic, don’t you

think?" Yes, a little, sure.

So, we’ve got people to thank—lots of them.

First, we are grateful to everyone who shared their stories and struggles

with us. The examples in this book are based on the experiences of real

people—clients, colleagues, neighbors, friends, family. Identifying details

have been changed, and in some cases we’ve created composites, but we’ve

tried to maintain the emotional truth of each story.

For many years it was our privilege to work at the Harvard Negotiation

Project with Roger Fisher. Roger is a grandfather of the field of conflict

management and was one of its most passionate practitioners. Getting to

Yes, written with William Ury and Bruce Patton, spread the word on

interest-based negotiation. Originally published in 1981, it is a masterpiece

—among the best things ever written about how human beings should deal

with differences. Roger died on August 25, 2012, at the age of ninety. As a

friend said at his memorial service, “It’s up to us now.” Indeed.

Our friend and Difficult Conversations coauthor Bruce Patton lives

Roger’s legacy daily—in the intellectual rigor he brings to any analysis and

in the tireless optimism with which he approaches some of the world’s

toughest conflicts. His contributions to the theory, practice, and pedagogy

of negotiation are far reaching, and his generous colleagueship over the past

twenty years has been invaluable.

The work of Chris Argyris, Donald Schön, Diana McLain Smith, Bob

Putnam, and Phil McArthur form another pillar in our thinking. Although

we don’t use the term, the “ladder of inference” helps organize chapter 3,

and ideas on contribution and defensive routines inform our thinking

throughout. Chris, thanks for your life’s work, and for the many lifetimes’

worth of ideas you have given the world.

Huge props go out to negotiation theorist and educator John Richardson,

who teaches at MIT’s Sloan School of Management. It was John who

introduced us to the foundational differences among appreciation, coaching,

and evaluation. The original formulation of those ideas can be found in

Getting It Done, which John wrote with Roger Fisher and Alan Sharp. It’s a

hidden gem in the communication canon.

Over the past twenty years, Bob Mnookin of Harvard Law School has

gone from being our (slightly intimidating) mentor to our close colleague

and friend. Teaching with you and teammates Erica Ariel Fox, Kathy

Holub, Alain Lemperer, Linda Netsch, Frank Sander, and Alain Laurent

Verbeke has been one of the most reliably satisfying experiences in our

professional lives.

At the Program on Negotiation, we thank Susan Hackley, James Kerwin,

Jessica MacDonald, Jim Sebenius, Dan Shapiro, Stephan Sonnenberg,

Guhan Subramanian, William Ury, and the small cadre of gifted students

who have worked with us as teaching assistants over the years. A special

thanks to Michael Wheeler, of Harvard Business School, who came up with

the title for this book on his first try.

In the fields of psychology and organizational behavior, we are indebted

to the research and writing of Aaron Beck, Carol Dweck, Amy Edmondson,

Dan Gilbert, Marshall Goldsmith, John Gottman, Lee Ross, and Martin

Seligman. Deep thanks as well to Jeffrey Kerr, Rick Lee, Sallyann Roth,

and Jody Scheier for their often uncanny insights into relationship

dynamics. Their ideas are all over this book.

Informing our understanding of neuroscience and behavior is the work of

Richard Davidson, Cate Fornier, Jonathan Haidt, Steven Johnson, and

Sophie Scott. Neuroscientist Cate helped us skate along the cliff’s edge of

simplification, without (we hope) ever toppling off.

Our friend psychologist Robin Weatherill has walked alongside us on the

entire journey, offering incisive comments, stories, observations, and ideas.

Thank you, Robin, for your willingness to be an honest mirror and for the

wide-ranging conversations during so many Friday-night dinners. You’ve

supported us in more ways than you know.

Many people have busy schedules, but our pal Adam Grant’s schedule is

really busy. The Hardest Working Man in Academia, Adam read a draft

while on book tour for his splendid Give and Take, passing along studies,

thoughts, and ideas we had missed.

Feedback from Scott Peppet at the University of Colorado was delivered

with such grace, precision, and wit that we wondered if he was somehow

making fun of us. Everyone should make such fun. Michael Moffitt, dean of

the School of Law at the University of Oregon, was the first person we

entrusted with a draft of the manuscript. Michael pushed us to simplify and

shorten. Well, we tried. Bob Bordone at Harvard Law School offered

incredibly useful feedback on the first half of the book, so if things

deteriorate halfway through, you know whom to blame.

Rob Ricigliano, Judy Rosenblum, and Linda Booth Sweeney are the only

three occupants of the intersecting Venn diagram sets formed by people

who (1) understand systems thinking, and (2) like us. Given the tight

quarters, it’s odd that they’ve never met. Thanks to each for their careful

reading and suggestions.

Erica Ariel Fox was too busy writing her own book, Winning from

Within, to help us with ours. Or was it we who were too busy to help her?

Anyway, no one helped anyone. And yet it was an extravagant luxury to

have such a close friend writing a book at the same time we were. Thank

you, Erica, for the love and encouragement from one who knows.

For their stories, editing, and unbounded willingness to discuss these

ideas, thanks to Jennifer Albanese, David Altschuler, Lana Proctor Banbury,

Stevenson Carlebach, Sara Clark, Nan Cochran, Ann Garrido, Micah

Garrido, Jill Grennan, Jack and Joyce Heen, Barbara and Maland

Hoffmann, Kathy Holub, Stacy Lennon, Rory Van Loo, Susan Lynch,

Celeste Mueller, Lea Ellermeier Nesbit, Andrew Richardson, Susan and

Bob Richardson, Tom Schaub, Angelique Skoulas, Anna Huckabee Tull,

Jim Tull, and Karen Vasso.

Our profound thanks to our colleagues at Triad: Sarah Seminski,

creative, industrious, and omnivorously talented; Elaine Lin, whose

intelligence and humanity so awe clients that they lose their ability not to

send her baked goods in the mail; Heather Sulejman, Triad’s heart and soul,

the one who keeps everyone sane but herself, and who appears almost

normal despite her frightening devotion to Depeche Mode. And our partner

Debbie Goldstein, the most universally loved person we know—Debbie,

through life’s ups and downs there’s no one we’d rather have beside us for

the long haul. (By the way, Taylor, we found Georgette. She was in her

office.)

Thanks also to those who shared their insights and ideas at the 2013

Triad retreat: Emily Epstein, Sharon Grady, Michele Gravelle and Sam

Brown, Peter Hiddema, Audrey Lee, Ryan Thompson, Gillien Todd, and

Rob Wilkinson; and to our colleagues and friends who have helped in so

many ways: Jeremy Ahouse, Lisle Baker, Eric Barker, Chris Benko,

Richard Birke, Robin Blass, Dawn Buckelew, Cecile Carr, Laura and Dick

Chasin and colleagues at the Public Conversations Project, Jared Curhan,

John Danas, Phil Davis, Alan Echtenkamp, Jac Fourie, Amy Fox, Mike

Garrido, Jim Golden, Eric Henry, David Hoffman, Bernardus Holtrop, Ted

Johnson, Dee Joyner, Ismail Kola, Susan McCafferty, Liz McClintock,

Jamie Moffitt, Monica Parker, Brenda Pehle, Jen Reynolds, Grace

Rubenstein, Danny and Louise Rubin, Gabriella Salvatore, Joe Scarlett and

Mary Fink, Jeff Seul, Olga Shvayetskaya, Linda Silver, Hill Snellings, Scott

Steinkerchner, Laila Sticpewich, Wojtek Sulejman, Don Thompson and

Joshua Weiss. BK Loren of the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, along with

classmates from the summer of 2012, provided invaluable guidance and

companionship as the project took shape; Angelique Skoulas generously

shared the quiet of her pied-à-terre in Cambridge during the homestretch;

mother-in-law Susan Richardson and husband John Richardson cheerfully

picked up the slack at home; and the staff of the Carlisle Public Library

embodied the ideal combination of “welcome back” and “we won’t bother

you” all along the way.

We have been collaborating with the folks at Duke Corporate Education

for more than a decade. They are invaluable partners in testing what is

useful to executives and organizations facing global challenges and change.

Holly Anastasio, Dennis Baltzley, Jonathan Besser, Laurie Beyl, Christina

Bortey, Jane Boswick-Caffrey, Nedra Bradsher, Cindy Campbell, Mike

Canning, Cindy Emrich, Pete Gerend, Monica Hill, Leah Houde, Robin

Easton Irving, Nancy Keeshan, Tim Last, Mary Kay Leigh, Pat Longshore,

Steve Mahaley, John Malitoris, Liz Mellon, Maureen Monroe, Carrie

Painter, Bob Reinheimer, Judy Rosenblum, Michael Serino, Blair Sheppard,

and Cheryl Stokes have become trusted friends as well as colleagues.

A big thanks to agent Esther Newberg and the team at ICM. You took us

on when we were pups, and over the years, our appreciation for your talent,

wisdom, and support has only deepened.

This is our second project with the team at Viking Penguin, and it’s been

just as gratifying this time around. Susan Petersen Kennedy and Clare

Ferraro were all in from the start, and we are deeply grateful for their

confidence in us. Cover designer Nick Misani hit a home run on his very

first swing. Nick, remember us in your acceptance speech at the industry

awards. Carla Bolte created a design that is fresh and inviting. The publicity

team—Carolyn Coleburn, Kristin Matzen, and Meredith Burks—along with

the marketing team—Nancy Sheppard, Paul Lamb, and Winnie De Moya—

shared our conviction that this was both a business book and psychology

book, and had great ideas for how to get it out to organizations and

individuals alike. Nick Bromley kept everything moving and everyone on

track.

We wrote several appreciative paragraphs about our editor, Rick Kot, but

Rick deleted them and in their place inserted this: “Rick is awesome, full

stop.” We’ll go with that and add this: Your clear-headed questions and

(endless) wise edits have made this a far better book, and the humor

embedded in your comments had us laughing out loud. Rick, we would

walk on gilded splinters for you. We’re hoping it doesn’t come to that, but if

it does, give us a call.

Doug wishes to acknowledge the incredible support of his closest

friends: Don, Syl, Kate, Annie, and Emma; Jimmy, Louisa, Susannah, and

Allyson; Wynn, Phyllis, Sophia, Alexa, and Nadia; Matt, Luann, Faulks,

Holly, Bloss, Manuela, and the Krausens, and all the guys over at the Sports

Barn and Monkey Down. For whatever reason, I won the friendship lottery

and I know just how lucky I am.

And family. Such a good-looking bunch. Rand, when we were growing

up, I thought of you as Superman, and I still do; Robbie, you have this

amazing ability to make everyone around you feel safe and happy (and I’m

sorry for trying to sell you tap water when we were little); Julie, you are the

quickest, funniest person I know, and I’m including myself in that

assessment; Dennis, Alana, and David, thanks for loving those first three

and for being such awesome in-laws. And to all of you, thanks for the

biggest gift of all, my niece and nephews—Andy, Charlie, Caroline, Colin,

Daniel, Luke, and Matty. Mom, I’ll catch up with you and Dad in the

dedication.

“Appreciation” doesn’t quite express Sheila’s indebtedness to her

husband, John Richardson, and kids, Ben, Petey, and Addy. They each put

up with a consuming project and pretended they weren’t keeping that favors

ledger I found behind the sofa. My amazing parents, Jack and Joyce,

bestowed a lifetime’s worth of acceptance and appreciation as well as a

healthy skepticism about others’ opinions of you, both good and bad. And

my grandmother Christine, who passed away at age 105 partway through

this project, demonstrated daily the gift of being able to laugh at yourself.

Robert and Susan, Jill and Jason, Stacy and Dan, Jim and Susan, Fred and

Jessica, Andrew and Amanda—each seemed to know just the right time to

inquire or encourage. It’s the feedback from each of you that is most

important to my own sense of self, and you have been compassionately

sparing, always.

A couple of words about grammar and names. We often use the gender-

neutral “they” in place of “he or she.” Though grammatically incorrect, it’s

a simple and clear way of describing those who are giving us feedback. We

wish to pre-thank those readers who refrain from sending complaints to

Viking Penguin. Such complaints would give them one more reason to say,

“We told you so.”

Though the names in the book represent a range of cultures and

traditions, we comment on culture only indirectly. Culture, of course, can

have a profound impact on the way feedback is given and heard; even so,

it’s our observation that the fears, frustrations, and triggered reactions we

have when receiving feedback are deeply human and universal.

And finally, our heartfelt appreciation to all those whom we’ve met and

will meet, who have the courage, curiosity, and commitment to seek out and

take in feedback when it matters most.

NOTES ON SOME RELEVANT ORGANIZATIONS

THE PROGRAM ON NEGOTIATION (PON) AT HARVARD LAW

SCHOOL

When Roger Fisher, Bill Ury, and Bruce Patton founded the Harvard

Negotiation Project (HNP) in 1979, they couldn’t have anticipated how

quickly the negotiation field would grow. In 1983 HNP gave birth to PON,

an umbrella organization and interuniversity consortium focused on

negotiation, mediation, dispute systems, and conflict resolution. Today

PON brings together a multidisciplinary community of researchers and

practitioners, and includes HNP and nine other projects focused on theory

building, social science research, and excellence in teaching and clinical

education.

HNP

Under the leadership of Director Professor James Sebenius, current HNP

projects include the Great Negotiator Study Initiative and the China

Negotiation Initiative. Past projects have included work on process that

contributed to the Camp David Accords of 1978; a training for all parties to

the negotiation process before the constitutional talks that ended apartheid

in South Africa; and a joint workshop for U.S. and Soviet diplomats among

many others. HNP is perhaps best known for the development of the theory

of “principled negotiation,” as presented in Getting to Yes, first published in

1981 (Penguin, 2011—third edition). Other books by the HNP team include

Difficult Conversations (Penguin, 2010—second edition); Getting Past No

(Bantam, 1993); Getting It Done (HarperBusiness, 1998); Beyond Reason

(Penguin, 2006); and 3D Negotiation (Harvard Business Review Press,

2006).

PON

Led by Professor Robert Mnookin and Executive Director Susan Hackley,

PON seeks to nurture the next generation of negotiation teachers and

scholars. Through a variety of lenses, including law, business, government,

psychology, economics, anthropology, the arts, and education, members of

the PON community seek to illuminate the causes of conflict and offer

prescriptive advice for managing conflict skillfully and efficiently. Why did

a deal fail that would have benefited both companies? Why did one country

resolve differences peacefully, while another fought a bloody civil war?

Why are some divorcing couples able to mediate their separation amicably,

while others fight painfully and expensively in court? PON is working to

push the theory forward and to help disseminate these competencies around

the world.

THE CLEARINGHOUSE

As part of its commitment to conflict management and negotiation

education, PON has developed a wealth of negotiation simulations, teaching

notes, videotaped demonstrations, and interactive video and electronic

lessons. These are available through PON’s Clearinghouse and Harvard

Business School Publishing.

EXECUTIVE EDUCATION

HNP pioneered the Negotiation Workshop course in the Harvard Law

School curriculum and HNP and PON offer executive education through the

Harvard Negotiation Institute (HNI) and PON’s Executive Seminar series.

Sheila Heen, Bruce Patton, and Douglas Stone offer an advanced course on

Difficult Business Conversations for executives through both HNI and the

PON Exec Ed series. For more information, see www.pon.harvard.edu.

TRIAD CONSULTING GROUP

Founded by Douglas Stone and Sheila Heen, Triad is a global consulting

and corporate education firm based in Harvard Square in Cambridge,

Massachusetts.

Whether you’re rolling out a major change initiative or seeking to

improve the day-to-day management skills of senior executives, we can

help. We work with clients to strengthen individual and organizational

capacity in a range of areas, including

Difficult Conversations

Negotiation and Problem Solving

The Influence Equation

Making Teams Work

Enhancing Impact Through the Systems Practice

Feedback and Learning

Typical consulting engagements include coaching an executive team to

function effectively when stakes are high and stakeholders divided; helping

to improve collaboration within and across functions; using systems

mapping to guide resource deployment and to optimize the impact of key

initiatives.

We offer executive coaching, team intervention, mediation and

facilitation, and keynote presentations and retreat experiences. We partner

with clients to design programs that respond to their context and challenges,

ensuring that the approach is relevant and realistic. Triad harnesses

connection and humor to enable senior executives to be honest with

themselves and one another about what they are up against. We know a lot

of this is tough stuff, and we’re in it with you.

Our clients span a dozen industries and six continents. They include

BAE, BHP, Capital One, Capgemini, Citigroup, the Educational Testing

Service, the Federal Reserve Bank, Genzyme, Hess, Honda, HSBC,

Johnson & Johnson, Massachusetts General Hospital, Merck, Metlife,

Novartis, Prudential, PwC, Shell, TimeWarner, Unilever, and Verizon.

In the public sector, we have worked with the White House, the

Singapore Supreme Court, the Ethiopian Parliament, UN/AIDS, The Nature

Conservancy, the Arctic Slope Regional Corporation, and New England

Organ Bank. Members of our team have taught and mediated in South

Africa, the Middle East, Kashmir, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Cyprus. Our

consultants teach at Harvard Law School, Georgetown Law School,

Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business, Tufts Fletcher School and School of

Medicine, Boston College, the University of Wisconsin, and MIT’s Sloan

School of Business. We have authored dozens of popular and scholarly

books and articles in the field.

Feel free to e-mail us at info@diffcon.com; call us at (617) 547-1728;

and visit Triad on the Web at www.triadconsultinggroup.com.

It all starts with a conversation.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Douglas Stone is a Lecturer on Law at Harvard Law School and a founder

of Triad Consulting Group (www.triadconsultinggroup.com). In addition to

corporate clients such as Citigroup, Honda, Johnson & Johnson, Shell, and

Turner Broadcasting, Stone has worked with journalists, educators, doctors,

diplomats, and political leaders in South Africa, Kashmir, and the Middle

East, and in Geneva with the World Health Organization and UN/AIDS. He

has trained senior political appointees at the White House and was a

keynote speaker at the World Negotiation Conference in São Paulo. His

articles have appeared in publications ranging from the New York Times to

Real Simple and the Harvard Business Review, and he has appeared on

Oprah, NPR, and many other television and radio shows. He is a graduate

of Harvard Law School, where he served as Associate Director of the

Harvard Negotiation Project. He can be reached at

dstone@post.harvard.edu.

Sheila Heen is a Lecturer on Law at Harvard Law School and a founder of

Triad Consulting Group (www.triadconsultinggroup.com). Her clients span

five continents and include TimeWarner, the Federal Reserve Bank, HSBC,

Metlife, Novartis, PwC, and Unilever. Heen often works with executive

teams to engage conflict productively, repair working relationships, make

sound decisions, and execute change in complex organizations. In the

public sector she has consulted for the New England Organ Bank, the

Singapore Supreme Court, Greek and Turkish Cypriots, and the Arctic

Slope Regional Corporation in Barrow, Alaska. Heen has worked with

theologians struggling with disagreement over the nature of truth and God,

and with senior political appointees for the White House. She has published

in the New York Times and the Harvard Business Review, and appeared on

shows as diverse as Oprah, Fox News, CNBC’s Power Lunch, and NPR. A

graduate of Harvard Law School, she is schooled in negotiation daily by her

three children. She can be reached at heen@post.harvard.edu.

For more about Doug and Sheila and free downloads to help yourself, visit

us at www.stoneandheen.com.

NOTES

Introduction: From Push to Pull

1. every schoolchild will be handed back as many as 300 assignments, papers, and tests:

American schoolchildren between the ages of 6 and 17 spend an average of 3 hours and 58

minutes on homework daily (www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/Do-Kids-Have-Too-Much-

Homework.html), and the average school year is 180 days

(www.nces.ed.gov/surveys/pss/tables/table_15.asp). If we assume one or two daily assignments,

and add term papers, pop quizzes, midterms, finals, and standardized testing, 300 is a

conservative estimate, particularly for high school students. Millions of kids will be assessed as

they try out for a team or audition to be cast in a school play: Thirty-five million children in

the United States play organized sports each year (www.statisticbrain.com/youth-sports-

statistics); there are 98,817 public schools in the United States

(www.nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=84), and 19 percent of those schools (18,775) offer

drama programs (www.nces.ed.gov/surveys/frss/publications/2002131/index.asp?sectionid=3).

Many of the 33,366 private schools also have drama programs. Almost 2 million teenagers will

receive SAT scores (www.press.collegeboard.org/sat/faq) and face college verdicts thick and

thin (www.statisticbrain.com/college-enrollment-statistics). At least 40 million people will be

sizing up one another for love online, where 71 percent of them believe they can judge love

at first sight (www.statisticbrain.com/online-dating-statistics); 250,000 weddings will be

called off (www.skybride.com/about), and 877,000 spouses will file for divorce

(www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/marriage_divorce_tables.htm): Centers for Disease Control numbers

include annulments but exclude data from California, Georgia, Hawaii, Indiana, Louisiana, and

Minnesota. U.S. Census Bureau records suggest that the annual divorce numbers run around 1.1

million (www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s0132.pdf).

2. Twelve million people will lose a job: Census records show that there were 12,645,000 job losses

in the private sector in 2010 (the last year for which data is available). This excludes nonprofits

and the self-employed. www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/1250635.pdf). More

than 500,000 entrepreneurs will open their doors for the first time, and almost 600,000 will

shut theirs for the last: The Small Business Administration shows 533,945 small business

“births” and 593,347 “deaths” for the year 2009-2010. (www.sba.gov/advocacy/849/12162).

3. between 50 and 90 percent of employees will receive performance reviews this year: Statistics

range widely, from those reported by the CEB that 51 percent of companies conduct formal

reviews annually (reported here: www.westchestermagazine.com/914-INC/Q2-2013/Improving-

Performance-Review-Policies-for-Managers-and-Employees) to the 91% of HR professionals

surveyed who reported that their organization has a formal performance-management program

(www.worldatwork.org/waw/adimLink?id=44473). Organizations with an HR function would

be more likely to have a formal system; those that don’t may have informal performance

practices. 825 million work hours . . . are spent each year preparing for and engaging in

annual reviews: According to the International Labor Office’s LABORSTA database, the

global labor pool consists of approximately 3.3 billion workers

(www.laborsta.ilo.org/applv8/data/EAPEP/eapep_E.html). If even half of them receive some

sort of review, and we estimate those reviews take 30 minutes to prepare for and execute on, that

comes to 94,178 years. The managers who are conducting the reviews would of course do

multiple reviews, so this is probably a conservative estimate.

4. 360-degree feedback is a process by which feedback is solicited from colleagues who are above

you, below you, and who are your peers. This input, often scrubbed of identifying details so that

it is anonymous, is collected into a report and provided to the receiver.

5. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 9th ed. (1986).

6. Fifty-five percent . . . said their performance review was unfair or inaccurate: 2011 survey

from Globoforce, www.bizjournals.com/boston/news/2011/04/29/survey-majority-hate-

performance.html. Cornerstone on Demand survey puts the statistic at 51 percent. See

www.getworksimple.com/blog/2012/01/20/4-statistics-that-prove-performance-reviews-don’t-

work-for-the-modern-worker. One in four employees dreads their performance review: See

2011 Globoforce survey, above.

7. Results of the 2010 Study on the State of Performance Management, survey of 750 HR

professionals by Sibson Consulting and World at Work, Fall 2010. Only 20 percent report that

when corporate performance is poor, individual ratings go down, indicating poor correlation

between individual performance and organizational performance. And just 40 percent say their

leaders model performance management through evaluation and coaching of direct reports.

http://www.sibson.com/publications/surveysandstudies/2010SPM.pdf.

8. For an overview of feedback-seeking behavior, see Michiel Crommelinck and Frederick Anseel,

“Understanding and Encouraging Feedback-Seeking Behavior: A Literature Review,” Medical

Education 2013; 47: 232–241, doi:10.1111/medu.12075. The connection between negative-

feedback seeking and performance reviews is explored in Z. G. Chen, W. Lam, J. A. Zhong,

“Leader-Member Exchange and Member Performance: A New Look at Individual-Level

Negative Feedback-Seeking Behaviour and Team-Level Empowerment Climate,” J Appl

Psychol 2007;92 (1):202–12, and in S. J. Ashford, A. S. Tsui, “Self-Regulation for Managerial

Effectiveness—the Role of Active Feedback Seeking,” Acad Manage J 1991;34 (2):251–80.

Studies that show a link between feedback-seeking behavior and creativity include J. Zhou,

“Promoting Creativity Through Feedback,” in J. Zhou, C. E. Shalley, eds Handbook of

Organizational Creativity. New York, NY: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates 2008; 125–46, and

DEM De Stobbeleir, S. J. Ashford, and D. Buyens, “Self-Regulation of Creativity at Work: The

Role of Feedback-Seeking Behavior in Creative Performance,” Acad Manage J 2011;54

(4):811–31. Exploration of feedback seeking and adaptation can be found in E. W. Morrison,

“Longitudinal Study of the Effects of Information Seeking on Newcomer Socialization,” J Appl

Psychol 1993;78 (2):173–83; C. R. Wanberg and J. D. Kammeyer-Mueller, “Predictors and

Outcomes of Proactivity in the Socialization Process,” J Appl Psychol 2000;85 (3):373–85; and

E. W. Morrison, “Newcomer Information-Seeking—Exploring Types, Modes, Sources, and

Outcomes,” Acad Manage J 1993;36 (3):557–89.

9. S. Carrere, et al. “Predicting Marital Stability and Divorce in Newlywed Couples,” Journal of

Family Psychology 14(1)(2000): 42–58. See generally: www.gottman.com. We note that

Gottman’s research relates specifically to the correlation between a husband’s openness to input

from his spouse and the health of the marriage. Whatever Gottman’s particular findings, it’s our

view that openness on anyone’s part will likely improve the health of a relationship.

10. Thomas Friedman, “It’s a 401(k) World,” New York Times, May 1, 2013.

Chapter 2: Separate Appreciation, Coaching, and Evaluation

1. The appreciation, coaching, and evaluation distinctions were introduced to us by John Richardson,
and are described in a book Richardson wrote with Roger Fisher and Alan Sharp called Getting
It Done: How to Lead When You’re Not in Charge (HarperBusiness, 1999).
2. Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman, First Break All the Rules: What the World’s Greatest
Managers Do Differently (Simon & Schuster, 1999), 28, 34.
3. Gary Chapman, The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love That Lasts (Northfield Publishing,
2009).
Chapter 3: First Understand
1. This diagram (the Feedback Arrow) and the concepts that follow are based in part on the “ladder
of inference,” a tool developed by Chris Argyris and Don Schön.
2. Roger Schank: http://www.rogerschank.com/artificialintelligence.html. See also Schank’s Tell Me
a Story: Narrative and Intelligence (Northwestern University Press, 1995).
3. The confirmation bias describes our propensity to notice information that conforms with our
preexisting views. See Raymond S. Nickerson, “Confirmation Bias: A Ubiquitous Phenomenon
in Many Guises,” Review of General Psychology (Educational Publishing Foundation) 2(2)
(1998): 175–220.
4. The self-serving bias describes our tendency to attribute our successes to our own abilities, and our
failures to external factors. This can lead to an inflated sense of our own abilities in relationship
to the abilities of others. For the driving example, see O. Svenson, “Are We All Less Risky and
More Skillful Than Our Fellow Drivers?” Acta Psychologica 47(2) (Feb. 1981): 143–48. The
managers’ inflated sense of their own performance comes from a 2007 BusinessWeek poll of
2000 U.S. executives (www.businessweek.com/stories/2007-08-19/ten-years-from-now-and).
5. David Foster Wallace, This Is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion, about
Living a Compassionate Life (Little, Brown and Company, 2009).
Chapter 4: See Your Blind Spots
1. Steven Johnson, Mind Wide Open: Your Brain and the Neuroscience of Everyday Life (Scribner,
2004), 31–32. For a fascinating discussion of human iris size and the evolution of cooperation,
see Michael Tomasello, “For Human Eyes Only,” New York Times, January 13, 2007.
2. For an overview of theory of mind see Alvin I. Goldman, “Theory of Mind,” in Oxford Handbook
of Philosophy and Cognitive Science, ed. Eric Margolis, Richard Samuels, and Stephen Stich
(Oxford University Press, 2012), 402.
3. See, for example, Simon Baron-Cohen, Alan M. Leslie, Uta Frith, “Does the Autistic Child Have a
‘Theory of Mind’?” Cognition 21 (1985) 37–46.
4. Johnson, Mind Wide Open, 31–32.
5. Albert Mehrabian, Nonverbal Communication (Aldine Transaction, 2007). Mehrabian, an emeritus
professor at U.C.L.A., claims that tone of voice accounts for 38 percent of our message, body
language 55 percent and the actual words spoken, only 7 percent.
6. Jon Hamilton, “Infants Recognize Voices, Emotions by 7 Months,” National Public Radio, March
24, 2010: http://www.wbur.org/npr/125123354/infants-recognize-voices-emotions-by-7-months.
Also, Annett Schirmer and Sonja Kotz, “Beyond the Right Hemisphere: Brain Mechanisms
Mediating Vocal Emotional Processing,” in Trends in Cognitive Sciences 10(1) (Jan. 2006): 24–
30.
7. Atul Gawande, “Personal Best,” New Yorker, October 3, 2011.

8. Sophie Scott, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College, London, interview on
Science Friday with Ira Flatow, May 29, 2009: http://m.npr.org/story/104708408.
9. See, for example, Paul Ekman, Emotions Revealed: Recognizing Faces and Feelings to Improve
Communication and Emotional Life (Holt Paperbacks, 2007). Ekman argues that due in part to
involuntary movement of certain facial muscles, we are not as good at disguising our emotions
as we think we are.
10. This is known as the actor-observer asymmetry (Jones and Nisbett, 1971). The actor tends to
attribute their behavior to the situation, while the observer tends to attribute the actor’s behavior
to the actor’s character. A related concept is the fundamental attribution error (Lee Ross, 1967),
which states that when we describe the behavior of others, we overemphasize character and
underemphasize situation.
11. Robert I. Sutton, Good Boss, Bad Boss: How to Be the Best . . . and Learn from the Worst
(Business Plus, 2010), 211.
12. Alex Pentland, Honest Signals: How They Shape Our World (MIT Press, 2008). For an overview
of research and applications, see Pentland, “To Signal Is Human,” American Scientist 98 (May–
June 2010), http://web.media.mit.edu/~sandy/2010-05Pentland.pdf.
13. In a New York Times article titled “I Know What You Think of Me” (June 15, 2013), writer Tim
Kreider discusses the negative effects of receiving an e-mail from a friend about himself that
was intended for another friend: “I’ve often thought that the single most devastating
cyberattack . . . would not be on the military or financial sector but simply to simultaneously
make every e-mail and text ever sent universally public . . . the fabric of society would instantly
evaporate. . . . Hearing other people’s uncensored opinions of you is an unpleasant reminder
that . . . everyone else does not always view you in the forgiving light that you hope they do,
making all allowances, always on your side.”
Chapter 5: Don’t Switchtrack
1. “Flowers for Kim,” Lucky Louie, Episode 6 (2006). Dialogue is slightly edited for language.
2. The fundamental attribution error was coined by Lee Ross in 1977. L. Ross, “The Intuitive
Psychologist and His Shortcomings: Distortions in the Attribution Process,” in L. Berkowitz,
Advances in Experimental Social Psychology (1977).
3. We like people who like us, and are like us. See Robert Cialdini, Influence: The Psychology of
Persuasion (HarperBusiness, 2006), especially chapter 5, “Liking: The Friendly Thief.”
4. For more on autonomy in negotiation, see Roger Fisher and Daniel Shapiro, Beyond Reason:
Using Emotions as You Negotiate (Penguin, 2006).
Chapter 6: Identify the Relationship System
1. Interview with John Gottman by Randall C. Wyatt in 2001 on psychotherapy.net,
http://www.psychotherapy.net/interview/john-gottman.
2. For a useful elaboration on relationship systems in business, see Diana McLain Smith, The
Elephant in the Room: How Relationships Make or Break the Success of Leaders and
Organizations (Jossey-Bass, 2011).
3. Peter M. Senge, Fifth Discipline Fieldbook: Strategies and Tools for Building a Learning
Organization. Crown Business; 1 edition (1994). “Accidental Adversaries” is described by
Jennifer Kemeny, based on her work in the 1980s, on pages 145–48.
4. Robert Ricigliano has explored the value of a systems perspective in conflict. See Robert
Ricigliano, Making Peace Last: A Toolbox for Sustainable Peacebuilding (Paradigm Publishers,

2012).
5. Daniel Kim, Michael Goodman, Charlotte Roberts, Jennifer Kemeny, “Archetype 1: ‘Fixes That
Backfire,’” in Peter M. Senge, The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook: Strategies and Tools for Building
a Learning Organization (Doubleday, 1994).
Chapter 7: Learn How Wiring and Temperament Affect Your Story
1. Enormous appreciation goes to neuropsychologist Dr. Cate Fortier for her review of this material,
and to Dr. Robin Weatherill for her insight and overview.
2. For a classic article introducing the idea of adaptability and subjective well-being, see: P.
Brickman and D. T. Campbell, “Hedonic Relativism and Planning the Good Society,” in
Adaptation-Level Theory, ed. M. H. Appley (New York: Academic Press, 1971), 287–305.
Adaptability is also referred to in the literature as “set point theory,” the “hedonistic treadmill,”
and “adaptability theory.”
3. D. Lykken and A. Tellegen, “Happiness Is a Stochastic Phenomenon,” Psychological Science 7
(1996): 186–89. Lykken suggests that 50 to 80 percent may be genetic; other studies suggest
closer to 50 percent. See S. Lyubomirsky, K. Sheldon, and D. Schkade, “Pursuing Happiness:
The Architecture of Sustainable Change,” Review of General Psychology 9(2) (2005): 111–31.
4. Piece compared lottery winners and those with spinal cord injuries: P. Brickman, D. Coates, and R.
Janoff-Bulman, “Lottery Winners and Accident Victims: Is Happiness Relative?” Journal of
Personality and Social Psychology 36 (1978): 917–27. Other research, however, suggests that
the matter is more complicated. See, for example, The Effects of Winning the Lottery on
Happiness, Life Satisfaction, and Mood, by D. Richard J. Tunney (Nottingham: University of
Nottingham, 2006).
5. A number of researchers have suggested that happy individuals react more strongly to pleasant
stimuli and that unhappy individuals react more strongly to unpleasant stimuli. See R. J. Larsen
and T. Ketelaar, “Personality and Susceptibility to Positive and Negative Emotional States,”
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 61 (1991): 132–40.
6. For an overview of Jerome Kagan’s work, see Robin Marantz Henig, “Understanding the Anxious
Mind,” New York Times, September 29, 2009. See also Jerome Kagan and Nancy Snidman, The
Long Shadow of Temperament (Belknap Press, 2009).
7. C. E. Schwartz, et al., “Structural Differences in Adult Orbital and Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex
Predicted by Infant Temperament at 4 Months of Age,” Archives of General Psychiatry 67(1)
(Jan. 2010): 78–84.
8. Jonathan Haidt, The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom (New York:
Basic Books, 2006), 29.
9. The limbic system is believed to have evolved with the first mammals, more than 100 million
years ago. For an excellent overview of the evolution of the brain, see “The Evolutionary Layers
of the Human Brain,”
http://thebrain.mcgill.ca/flash/d/d_05/d_05_cr/d_05_cr_her/d_05_cr_her.html.
10. Richard J. Davidson, Ph.D., with Sharon Begley, The Emotional Life of Your Brain: How Its
Unique Patterns Affect the Way You Think, Feel, and Live—and How You Can Change Them
(Hudson Street Press, 2002), 41 and 69.
11. Ibid., 24–39.
12. A separate 2012 review of fMRI and PET scan studies done between 1990 and 2007 concluded
that a “locational” theory of distinct emotions is less supported than the “conceptual” theory—
i.e., that different parts of the brain are involved in interpreting emotions and events. K.

Lindquist, et al., “The Brain Basis of Emotion: A Meta-Analytic Review,” Behavioral Brain
Sciences 35 (2012): 121–43.
13. Two primary studies: R. J. Davidson, “What Does the Prefrontal Cortex ‘Do’ in Affect:
Perspectives in Frontal EEG Asymmetry Research,” Biological Psychology 67 (2004): 219–34.
On the differences in white matter, see: M. J. Kim and P. J. Whalen, “The Structural Integrity of
an Amygdala-Prefrontal Pathway Predicts Trait Anxiety,” Journal of Neuroscience 29 (2009):
11614–18.
14. In The Resilience Factor: 7 Keys to Finding Your Inner Strength and Overcoming Life’s Hurdles
(New York: Broadway Books, 2002), Karen Reivich and Andrew Shatté talk about resilience
having four uses—to overcome obstacles in childhood, to steer through everyday frustrations, to
bounce back from major setbacks, and to reach out to achieve all you can. We are using it in the
biological sense here, but the impact would affect all of these, which we refer to at various times
throughout the book.
15. Davidson with Begley, Emotional Life of Your Brain, 83–85.
16. Richard Davidson has created questionnaires that can help you get a handle on your profile with
respect to both the time it takes you to recover from negative feelings, and your ability to sustain
positive feelings. See Davidson and Begley, Emotional Life of Your Brain, 46–49.
17. See S. Lyubomirsky, K. Sheldon, and D. Schkade, “Pursuing Happiness: The Architecture of
Sustainable Change,” Review of General Psychology 9(2) (2005): 111–31. See also Martin E. P.
Seligman, Flourish: A Visionary New Understanding of Happiness and Well-being (Atria
Books, 2012), 157 and 159.
18. Seligman, Flourish, 157 and 159.
19. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience (Harper Perennial,
2008).
20. Haidt, Happiness Hypothesis, 30–31.
21. Variations on what we are calling “snowballing” have also been referred to as catastrophizing.
See David D. Burns, Feeling Good. Harper (reprint edition 2009), p. 42. Chris Argyris refers to
the phenomenon as the “doom zoom” in “Teaching Smart People How to Learn,” Harvard
Business Review May–June 1991, p. 104.
Chapter 8: Dismantle Distortions
1. Our ideas on the relationship between thoughts, feelings, and story, and how to “contain the
feedback” are informed by work in the fields of cognitive and narrative therapy. See, for
example, Martin E. P. Seligman, Authentic Happiness: Using the New Positive Psychology to
Realize Your Potential for Lasting Fulfillment (Atria Books, 2004); Aaron T. Beck, Love Is
Never Enough: How Couples Can Overcome Misunderstandings, Resolve Conflicts, and Solve
Relationship Problems Through Cognitive Therapy (Harper Perennial, 1989); and Michael
White and David Epstein, Narrative Means to Therapeutic Ends (W. W. Norton & Company,
1990).
2. Daniel Gilbert, Stumbling on Happiness (Vintage, 2007), 167.
3. People’s tendency to overestimate the extent to which anyone else is paying attention to them is
referred to as the “spotlight effect” or egocentrism. For more on the spotlight effect, see Thomas
Gilovich and Kenneth Savitsky, “The Spotlight Effect and the Illusion of Transparency:
Egocentric Assessments of How We Are Seen by Others,” Current Directions in Psychological
Science 8(6) (Dec. 1999).

Chapter 9: Cultivate a Growth Identity
1. There is evidence that Western cultures—American and European—are more likely to describe
self in abstract trait terms (I’m honest, I’m smart), while Asian cultures—Chinese, Korean,
Indian—are more likely to describe self in contextual and relational terms (I’m a student, I’m a
brother). For more on cultural differences in self-concept and character, see Incheol Choi,
Richard E. Nisbett, and Ara Norenzayan, “Causal Attribution Across Cultures: Variation and
Universality,” Psychological Bulletin 125(1) (1999): 47–63.
2. Leon Festinger first proposed the idea that we measure ourselves against our peers, called social
comparison theory. See L. Festinger, “A Theory of Social Comparison Processes,” Human
Relations 7 (1954): 117–40.
3. This observation was made by our colleague Jeffrey Kerr in conversation.
4. From Carol S. Dweck, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success (Ballantine Books, 2006) 3.
5. Ibid., 4.
6. Ibid.
7. Dweck, Mindset, 11, describing research conducted with Joyce Ehrlinger.
8. Jennifer A. Mangels, Brady Butterfield, Justin Lamb, Catherine Good, and Carol S. Dweck, “Why
Do Beliefs About Intelligence Influence Learning Success? A Social Cognitive Neuroscience
Model,” Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci. 2006 September; 1(2): 75–86.
9. Carol Dweck, “Brainology: Transforming Students’ Motivation to Learn,” NAIS Independent
Schools Magazine, Winter 2008, www.nais.org/Magazines-Newsletters/IS
Magazine/Pages/Brainology.aspx, accessed September 18, 2013. Article contains a helpful
summary of key research on fixed- and growth-mindset responses to struggle or failure.
10. This Identity chart is an adaptation of Dweck’s chart in Mindset, 245.
11. The ability to distinguish assessment and judgment may help explain why people with fixed
mindsets are notoriously poor at assessing their own abilities. People with growth mindsets
more accurately assess their current abilities, perhaps because they don’t have the same sense of
judgment about where they stand. Where they stand is only a momentary stop on the journey to
where they are going.
Chapter 10: How Good Do I Have to Be?
1. Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life (Pantheon, 1994), 44.
2. For helpful advice on how to say no, see William Ury, The Power of a Positive No: Save the Deal,
Save the Relationship and Still Say No (Bantam, 2007).
Chapter 11: Navigate the Conversation
1. The first short film using computer animation and keyframing was the 1974 film Hunger.
(“Keyframing” is spelled as one word, as is “inbetweening.”) Thanks to John Hughes and
Pauline Ts’o at Rhythm & Hues for showing us firsthand how computer animation works.
2. Jared R. Curhan and Alex Pentland, “Thin Slices of Negotiation: Predicting Outcomes from
Conversational Dynamics Within the First 5 Minutes,” Journal of Applied Psychology 92(3)
(2007): 802–11.
3. John Gottman and Nan Silver, Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work (Three Rivers Press,
2000), 22, 27, 39–40. See also J. M. Gottman and R. W. Levenson, “Marital Processes
Predictive of Later Dissolution: Behavior, Physiology, and Health,” Journal of Personality and

Social Psychology 63 (1992): 221–33; and J. M. Gottman and C. I. Notarius, “Decade Review:
Observing Marital Interaction,” Journal of Marriage and the Family 62 (2000): 927–47.
4. T. Singer, et al., “Empathy for Pain Involves the Affective but Not Sensory Components of Pain,”
Science 33(5661) (Feb. 20, 2004): 1157–62. Watching another’s pain does not activate the entire
“pain matrix,” but only the part of the brain associated with its affective qualities (bilateral
anterior insula, rostral anterior cingulate cortex, brainstem, and cerebellum), but not its sensory
qualities (posterior insula/secondary somatosensory cortex, sensorimotor cortex, and caudal
anterior cingulate cortex). You don’t feel physical pain, but you feel the emotions correlated
with physical pain. Of note: People who scored higher on two empathy questionnaires also had
stronger mirror neuron brain activity.
5. T. Singer, et al., “Empathic Neural Responses Are Modulated by the Perceived Fairness of
Others,” Nature 439 (Jan. 26, 2006): 466–69. Interestingly, it was overwhelmingly men who had
the revenge reaction; it is yet unclear whether this holds generally across studies or is a function
of this particular cohort.
6. The interpretation of interruptions varies across cultures. If you are operating in a culture with
implicit (or explicit) rules against interrupting (a superior, or an elder, for example), you might
instead write down key points and your questions as you listen, letting them know that you are
taking notes in order to best understand what they are saying. After they finish, you can ask
questions at an appropriate time and place. The goal is to be respectful and engaged, and to
work with them to clarify their feedback. Linguist Deborah Tannen has an interesting discussion
of culture and interruption in Conversational Style: Analyzing Talk Among Friends (Oxford
University Press, 2005).
7. Roger Fisher, William Ury, and Bruce Patton, Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without
Giving In, 3rd ed. (Penguin, 2011). For an application of these ideas specifically to law and
business, see Robert H. Mnookin, Scott R. Peppet, and Andrew S. Tulumello, Beyond Winning:
Negotiating to Create Value in Deals and Disputes (Belknap Press, 2004), and David A. Lax
and James K. Sebenius, 3-D Negotiation: Powerful Tools to Change the Game in Your Most
Important Deals (Harvard Business Review Press, 2006).
Chapter 12: Get Going
1. See this original study at R. F. Baumeister, et al., “Ego Depletion: Is the Active Self a Limited
Resource?” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 74(5) (1998): 1252–65. The
participants asked to refrain from eating cookies were asked to eat radishes instead. The cookie
eaters made an average of 34.29 attempts and persisted for 18.9 minutes, while the radish eaters
made an average of 19.4 attempts while persisting for 8.35 minutes. It’s reasonable to wonder
whether the different amounts of sugar intake and resulting blood glucose levels might have
increased the cookie eaters’ energy. The researchers did not find a correlation between glucose
levels and willpower. For an expanded discussion of willpower, see Roy Baumeister and John
Tierney, Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength (Penguin, 2012).
2. Atul Gawande, “Personal Best,” New Yorker, October 3, 2011.
3. Chuck Leddy, “Coaching Tips from Gawande: Surgeon-Author Sees Gain for Teachers in On-the-
Job Guidance,” Harvard Gazette, October 25, 2012.
4. T. C. Schelling, “Egonomics, or the Art of Self-Management,” American Economic Review, 68
(1978), 290-294. See also, Thomas C. Schelling, Strategy of Conflict (Harvard University Press,
1981).
5. Nick Paumgarten, “Master of Play,” New Yorker, December 20, 2010.

6. The term “gamification” was coined by Nick Pelling in 2002. The concept and approach has
moved into mainstream use since about 2010, with the business world using it to increase
customer engagement and loyalty, Wikipedia using it to increase contributions (by 64 percent!),
and education using gamification principles to find ways to increase student participation in
learning. The movement also has its vociferous critics. See blog post by Ben Betts at
http://www.astd.org/Publications/Blogs/Learning-Technologies-Blog/2013/03/Gamification-
Meet-Gamefulness, and for a more general critique, Alfie Kohn, Punished by Rewards: The
Trouble with Gold Stars, A’s, Praise and Other Bribes (Mariner Books, 1999).
7. For a slightly different take on this, see Seth Godin, The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You
When to Quit (and When to Stick) (Portfolio Hardcover, 2007).
8. For an overview of feedback-seeking behavior, see Michiel Crommelinck and Frederick Anseel,
“Understanding and Encouraging Feedback-Seeking Behavior: A Literature Review” in Medical
Education 2013; 47: 232–41, doi:10.1111/medu.12075. The connection between negative-
feedback seeking and performance reviews is explored in Z. G. Chen, W. Lam, and J. A. Zhong,
“Leader-Member Exchange and Member Performance: A New Look at Individual-Level
Negative Feedback-Seeking Behaviour and Team-Level Empowerment Climate,” J Appl
Psychol 2007;92 (1):202–12; and in S. J. Ashford, A. S. Tsui, “Self-Regulation for Managerial
Effectiveness—The Role of Active Feedback Seeking,” Acad Manage J 1991;34 (2): 251–80.
Chapter 13: Pull Together
1. Results of the 2010 Study on the State of Performance Management, survey of 750 HR
professionals by Sibson Consulting and World at Work, Fall 2010. Only 20 percent report that
when corporate performance is poor, individual ratings go down, indicating poor correlation
between individual performance and organizational performance. And just 40 percent say their
leaders model performance management through evaluation and coaching of direct reports;
http://www.sibson.com/publications/surveysandstudies/2010SPM.pdf.
2. Susan Heathfield, “Performance Appraisals Don’t Work,” Human Resources, available at
www.humanresources.about.com/od/performanceevals/a/perf_appraisal.html. Accessed
February 2013.
3. Brené Brown, October 2012, from her presentation at the Linkage Global Institute for Leadership
Development Conference, Palm Desert, CA.
4. Dick Grote, 12:17PM September 12, 2011, “The Myth of Performance Metrics,” Harvard Business
Review blog post, at www.blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/09/the_myth_of_performance_metric.html?
cm_sp=blog_flyout-_-cs-_-the_myth_of_performance_metric. Grote is the author of How to Be
Good at Performance Appraisals: Simple, Effective, Done Right (Harvard Business Review
Press, 2011).
5. Results of the 2010 Study of Performance Management (Fall 2010) 4. When asked who the biggest
champions of the performance management system are, 73 percent report it’s the top HR
executive; 30 percent say the CEO (totals equal more than 100 percent because they could select
more than one response).
6. Ibid., 5.
7. For an in-depth examination of psychological safety in the workplace, see Amy Edmondson,
Teaming: How Organizations Learn, Innovate, and Compete in the Knowledge Economy
(Jossey-Bass, 2012).
8. For more analysis and advice on appreciation in the workplace, see Gary Chapman and Paul
White, The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace: Empowering Organizations by
Encouraging People (Northfield Publishing, 2011).

9. The concept of multitrack diplomacy is presented in William D. Davidson and Joseph V.

Montville, “Foreign Policy According to Freud,” Foreign Policy 45 (Winter 1981–82): 145–57.

These principles are at the philosophical core of ongoing work done by the Institute for Multi-

Track Diplomacy, founded by John W. McDonald and Louise Diamond.

10. Robert Cialdini, Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion (HarperBusiness, 2006).

ROAD MAP
INTRODUCTION
From Push to Pull
WHAT COUNTS AS FEEDBACK?
A BRIEF HISTORY OF FEEDBACK
PULL BEATS PUSH
THE TENSION BETWEEN LEARNING AND BEING ACCEPTED
THE BENEFITS OF RECEIVING WELL
DIGGING FOR PONIES
THE FEEDBACK CHALLENGE
1. THREE TRIGGERS
That Block Feedback
THREE FEEDBACK TRIGGERS
WHY WE GET TRIGGERED AND WHAT HELPS
1. TRUTH TRIGGERS: THE FEEDBACK IS WRONG, UNFAIR, UNHELPFUL
Separate Appreciation, Coaching, and Evaluation
First Understand
See Your Blind Spots
2. RELATIONSHIP TRIGGERS: I CAN’T HEAR THIS FEEDBACK FROM YOU
Don’t Switchtrack: Disentangle What from Who
Identify the Relationship System

3. IDENTITY TRIGGERS: THE FEEDBACK IS THREATENING AND I’M OFF
BALANCE
Learn How Wiring and Temperament Affect Your Story
Dismantle Distortions
Cultivate a Growth Identity
TRUTH TRIGGERS
2. SEPARATE APPRECIATION, COACHING, AND EVALUATION
ONE DAD, TWO REACTIONS
THERE ARE THREE KINDS OF FEEDBACK
APPRECIATION
COACHING
EVALUATION
WE NEED ALL THREE
EVALUATION SHORTFALLS
APPRECIATION SHORTFALLS
COACHING SHORTFALLS
BEWARE CROSS-TRANSACTIONS
A COMPLICATION: THERE IS ALWAYS EVALUATION IN COACHING
WHAT HELPS?
GET ALIGNED: KNOW THE PURPOSE AND DISCUSS IT
SEPARATE EVALUATION FROM COACHING AND APPRECIATION
3. FIRST UNDERSTAND
Shift from “That’s Wrong” to “Tell Me More”
WE’RE GOOD AT WRONG SPOTTING
UNDERSTANDING IS JOB ONE
FEEDBACK ARRIVES WITH GENERIC LABELS
GIVER AND RECEIVER INTERPRET THE LABEL DIFFERENTLY
Play “Spot the Label”

WHAT’S UNDER THE LABEL?
Coming From and Going To
ASK WHERE THE FEEDBACK IS COMING FROM
They Observe Data
They Interpret the Data
They Confuse Data and Interpretation (We All Do)
ASK WHERE THE FEEDBACK IS GOING
When Receiving Coaching: Clarify Advice
When Receiving Evaluation: Clarify Consequences and
Expectations
SHIFT FROM WRONG SPOTTING TO DIFFERENCE SPOTTING
DIFFERENT DATA
Biases Drive Data Collection
DIFFERENCES IN INTERPRETATION
Implicit Rules
Heroes and Villains
ASK: WHAT’S RIGHT?
WHEN YOU STILL DISAGREE
“WHY CAN’T FEEDBACK JUST BE OBJECTIVE?”
A CONVERSATION WITH COMMENTARY
PAUL’S PREPARATION: MINDSET AND GOALS
THE CONVERSATION

4. SEE YOUR BLIND SPOTS
Discover How You Come Across
THE GAP MAP
BEHAVIORAL BLIND SPOTS
YOUR LEAKY FACE
YOUR LEAKY TONE
YOUR LEAKY PATTERNS
E-MAIL BODY LANGUAGE
THEY MAY SEE EXACTLY WHAT WE ARE TRYING TO HIDE
THREE BLIND-SPOT AMPLIFIERS
AMPLIFIER 1: EMOTIONAL MATH
AMPLIFIER 2: SITUATION VERSUS CHARACTER
AMPLIFIER 3: IMPACT VERSUS INTENT
THE RESULT: OUR (GENERALLY POSITIVE) SELF
WE COLLUDE TO KEEP EACH OTHER IN THE DARK
WHAT HELPS US SEE OUR BLIND SPOTS?
USE YOUR REACTION AS A BLIND-SPOT ALERT
ASK: HOW DO I GET IN MY OWN WAY?
LOOK FOR PATTERNS
GET A SECOND OPINION
Honest Mirrors Versus Supportive Mirrors
RECORD YOURSELF
FOCUS ON CHANGE FROM THE INSIDE OUT
HAVE A PURPOSE
RELATIONSHIP TRIGGERS
5. DON’T SWITCHTRACK
Disentangle What from Who
RELATIONSHIP TRIGGERS CREATE SWITCHTRACK CONVERSATIONS
SWITCHTRACKING DEFEATS FEEDBACK
SILENT SWITCHTRACKING CAN BE WORSE
TWO RELATIONSHIP TRIGGERS

WHAT WE THINK ABOUT THEM
Skill or Judgment: How, When, or Where They Gave the Feedback
Credibility: They Don’t Know What They’re Talking About
Trust: Their Motives Are Suspect
SURPRISE PLAYERS IN THE FEEDBACK GAME
Strangers
Those You Least Like and Who Are Least Like You
HOW WE FEEL TREATED BY THEM
Appreciation
Autonomy
Acceptance
RELATIONSHIP TRIGGERS: WHAT HELPS?
SPOT THE TWO TOPICS
GIVE EACH TOPIC ITS OWN TRACK
Signposting
LISTEN FOR THE RELATIONSHIP ISSUES LURKING BENEATH THEIR
“ADVICE”
LOUIE AND KIM: TAKE TWO
6. IDENTIFY THE RELATIONSHIP SYSTEM
Take Three Steps Back
WHO IS THE PROBLEM AND WHO NEEDS TO CHANGE?
SEE THE RELATIONSHIP SYSTEM
TAKE THREE STEPS BACK

ONE STEP BACK: YOU + ME INTERSECTIONS
TWO STEPS BACK: ROLE CLASHES AND ACCIDENTAL ADVERSARIES
THREE STEPS BACK: THE BIG PICTURE (OTHER PLAYERS, PROCESSES,
POLICIES, AND STRUCTURES)
FEEDBACK THROUGH A SYSTEMS LENS
THE BENEFITS OF A SYSTEMS LENS
IT’S MORE ACCURATE
IT MOVES US AWAY FROM NEEDLESS JUDGMENT
IT ENHANCES ACCOUNTABILITY
IT HELPS CORRECT OUR TENDENCY TO SHIFT OR ABSORB
Blame Absorbers: It’s All Me
Blame Shifters: It’s Not Me
IT HELPS US AVOID “FIXES THAT FAIL”
TALKING ABOUT SYSTEMS
BE ON THE LOOKOUT
TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR PART
“HERE’S WHAT WOULD HELP ME CHANGE”
LOOK FOR THEMES: IS THIS A ME + EVERYBODY INTERSECTION?
USE THE SYSTEM TO SUPPORT CHANGE (NOT THWART IT)
IDENTITY TRIGGERS
7. LEARN HOW WIRING AND TEMPERAMENT AFFECT YOUR STORY
THE LIBERATION OF HARD WIRING
A BEHIND-THE-SCENES LOOK AT YOURSELF ON FEEDBACK
1. Baseline: The Beginning and End of the Arc
2. Swing: How Far Up or Down You Go
Bad Is Stronger Than Good
3. Sustain and Recovery: How Long Does the Swing Last?

Negative Recovery: Righty or Lefty?
Sustaining Positive Feelings
Four Sustain/Recovery Combinations
WIRING IS ONLY PART OF THE STORY
THE MAGIC 40
EMOTIONS DISTORT OUR SENSE OF THE FEEDBACK ITSELF
OUR STORIES HAVE AN EMOTIONAL SOUNDTRACK
THOUGHTS + FEELINGS = STORY
HOW FEELINGS EXAGGERATE FEEDBACK
OUR PAST: THE GOOGLE BIAS
OUR PRESENT: NOT ONE THING, EVERYTHING
OUR FUTURE: THE FOREVER BIAS AND SNOWBALLING
8. DISMANTLE DISTORTIONS
See Feedback at “Actual Size”
SETH TAKES A RELAXING VACATION
FIVE WAYS TO DISMANTLE DISTORTIONS
1. BE PREPARED, BE MINDFUL
Know Your Feedback Footprint
Inoculate Yourself Against the Worst
Notice What’s Happening
2. SEPARATE THE STRANDS: FEELING / STORY / FEEDBACK
Our Stories Shadowbox with the Past
3. CONTAIN THE STORY
Use a Feedback Containment Chart
Draw the Balancing Picture
Right-Size the Future Consequences

4. CHANGE YOUR VANTAGE POINT
Imagine You’re an Observer
Look Back from the Future
Cast the Comedy
5. ACCEPT THAT YOU CAN’T CONTROL HOW OTHERS SEE YOU
Have Compassion for Them
WHEN LIFE COMES DOWN HARD
DROWNING
ASK FOR SUPPORT
9. CULTIVATE A GROWTH IDENTITY
Sort Toward Coaching
FEEDBACK CAN ROCK OUR SENSE OF SELF
IDENTITY: OUR SELF-STORY
IS YOUR IDENTITY BRITTLE OR ROBUST?
GIVE UP SIMPLE LABELS AND CULTIVATE COMPLEXITY
KEEP IT OUT OR LET IT IN?
EMBRACE IDENTITY NUANCE
THREE THINGS TO ACCEPT ABOUT YOURSELF
You Will Make Mistakes
You Have Complex Intentions
You Have Contributed to the Problem
YOU’VE BEEN COMPLICATED ALL ALONG
SHIFT FROM A FIXED MINDSET TO A GROWTH MINDSET
PUZZLING KIDS
FIXED VERSUS GROWTH ASSUMPTIONS

BUT AREN’T SOME TRAITS FIXED?
IMPLICATIONS FOR HOW WE RESPOND TO FEEDBACK AND CHALLENGE
The Accuracy of Our Self-Perception
How We Listen to Feedback
How We Respond to Struggle Can Create Self-fulfilling Prophecies
The Framing Matters
MOVE TOWARD A GROWTH IDENTITY
PRACTICE #1: SORT TOWARD COACHING
Hear Coaching as Coaching
When Coaching and Evaluation Get Tangled
PRACTICE #2: UNPACK JUDGMENT FROM THE EVALUATION SUITCASE
PRACTICE #3: GIVE YOURSELF A “SECOND SCORE”
FEEDBACK IN CONVERSATION
10. HOW GOOD DO I HAVE TO BE?
Draw Boundaries When Enough Is Enough
FINDING BOUNDARIES, SETTING BOUNDARIES
THREE BOUNDARIES
1. I MAY NOT TAKE YOUR ADVICE
2. I DON’T WANT FEEDBACK ABOUT THAT SUBJECT, NOT RIGHT NOW
3. STOP, OR I WILL LEAVE THE RELATIONSHIP
HOW DO I KNOW IF BOUNDARIES ARE NEEDED?
DO THEY ATTACK YOUR CHARACTER, NOT JUST YOUR BEHAVIOR?
IS THE FEEDBACK UNRELENTING?
WHEN YOU DO CHANGE, IS THERE ALWAYS ONE MORE DEMAND?
DOES THE FEEDBACK GIVER TAKE THE RELATIONSHIP HOSTAGE?

ARE THEY ISSUING WARNINGS—OR MAKING THREATS?
IS IT ALWAYS YOU WHO HAS TO CHANGE?
ARE YOUR VIEWS AND FEELINGS A LEGITIMATE PART OF THE
RELATIONSHIP?
WHERE BOUNDARIES WOULD HELP: SOME COMMON RELATIONSHIP
PATTERNS
THE CONSTANT CRITIC
HATE-LOVE-HATE RELATIONSHIPS
RENOVATION RELATIONSHIPS
BUT WAIT, DOES THAT MEAN . . . ?
TURNING AWAY FEEDBACK WITH GRACE AND HONESTY
BE TRANSPARENT: ACTUALLY TELL THEM
BE FIRM—AND APPRECIATIVE
REDIRECT UNHELPFUL COACHING
USE “AND”
BE SPECIFIC ABOUT YOUR REQUEST
DESCRIBE CONSEQUENCES
YOU HAVE A DUTY TO MITIGATE THE COST TO OTHERS
INQUIRE ABOUT, AND ACKNOWLEDGE, THE IMPACT ON THEM
COACH THEM TO DEAL WITH THE UNCHANGED YOU
PROBLEM SOLVE TOGETHER
11. NAVIGATE THE CONVERSATION
KEYFRAMES OF THE CONVERSATION
THE ARC OF THE CONVERSATION: OPEN-BODY-CLOSE
OPEN BY GETTING ALIGNED
CLARIFY PURPOSE, CHECK STATUS
1. Is This Feedback? If So, What Kind?
2. Who Decides?
3. Is This Final or Negotiable?
YOU CAN INFLUENCE THE FRAME AND AGENDA
BODY: FOUR SKILLS FOR MANAGING THE CONVERSATION

LISTEN FOR WHAT’S RIGHT (AND WHY THEY SEE IT DIFFERENTLY)
Your Internal Voice Is Crucial
Triggered: From Assistant to Bodyguard
When Empathy Shuts Down
What Helps? Listen with a Purpose
Prepare to Listen
Find the Trigger Patterns
And Then Negotiate
Listening’s Second Purpose: To Let Them Know You Hear Them
Beware Hot Inquiry
ASSERT WHAT’S LEFT OUT
Shift from “I’m Right” to “Here’s What’s Left Out”
Common Assertion Mistakes
Truth Mistakes
Relationship Mistakes
Identity Mistakes
BE YOUR OWN PROCESS REFEREE
Process Moves: Diagnose, Describe, Propose
PROBLEM SOLVE TO CREATE POSSIBILITIES
Create Possibilities
Dig for Underlying Interests
Three Sources of Interests Behind Feedback

Generate Options
CLOSE WITH COMMITMENT
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER: A CONVERSATION IN MOTION
AN EVALUATION CONVERSATION ABOUT RATINGS AND BONUSES
Version One
Version Two
Version Three
Version Four: A More Skillful Conversation
12. GET GOING
Five Ways to Take Action
NAME ONE THING
ASK: “WHAT’S ONE THING YOU SEE ME DOING THAT GETS IN MY OWN
WAY?”
LISTEN FOR THEMES
ASK WHAT MATTERS TO THEM
TRY SMALL EXPERIMENTS
DON’T DECIDE, EXPERIMENT
Try It On
Try It Out
You May Be Surprised
IT’S NOT ALL-AND-ALWAYS
RIDE OUT THE J CURVE
TWO DECISION MAKERS
INCREASE THE POSITIVE APPEAL OF CHANGE
Make It Social

Keep Score
INCREASE THE COST OF NOT CHANGING
Tie Yourself to the Mast
Recognize the J Curve
COACH YOUR COACH
WHAT COACHING YOUR COACH DOESN’T MEAN
TALK ABOUT “FEEDBACK AND YOU”
DISCUSS PREFERENCES, ROLES, AND MUTUAL EXPECTATIONS
HIERARCHY AND TRUST
DON’T BECOME A GIMME-FEEDBACK FANATIC
YOUR COACH CAN HELP YOU GET IN SYNC
WHEN THE PERSON BEING COACHED IS THE BOSS
INVITE THEM IN
A GOOD LISTENER ASKS FOR HELP
A FRUSTRATED ADVISER OPENS UP
PERFECT FEEDBACK FOR THE PERFECT PERSON
SHIFTING MIRRORS
We Triangulate for Comfort, but Not Coaching
Hank Has a Hunch
Make Two Lists to Stay on Track
13. PULL TOGETHER
Feedback in Organizations
THERE ARE NO PERFECT FEEDBACK SYSTEMS
CAN’T LIVE WITH IT, CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT IT
WHAT LEADERSHIP AND HR CAN DO
1. DON’T JUST TRUMPET BENEFITS, EXPLAIN TRADEOFFS
2. SEPARATE APPRECIATION, COACHING, AND EVALUATION

3. PROMOTE A CULTURE OF LEARNERS
Highlight Learning Stories
Cultivate Growth Identities
Discuss Second Scores
Create Multitrack Feedback
Leverage Positive Social Norming
WHAT TEAM LEADERS AND FEEDBACK GIVERS CAN DO
1. MODEL LEARNING, REQUEST COACHING
2. AS GIVERS, MANAGE YOUR OWN MINDSET AND IDENTITY
3. BE AWARE OF HOW INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES COLLIDE IN
ORGANIZATIONS
WHAT RECEIVERS CAN DO

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